Lina Khan est une de mes héroine politique : comment apliquer un programme radical dans un univers poilitique qui refuse le radicalisme. Elle y parvient, et c’est bien ce que les milliardaires lui reprochent le plus.
Two billionaire Democratic donors have publicly pressured Vice President Kamala Harris to replace the F.T.C. chair, Lina Khan. Wall Street insiders are worried that could backfire.
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Wall Street donors are working to gain influence with Vice President Kamala Harris.Credit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times
Lauren HirschSarah Kessler
By Lauren Hirsch and Sarah Kessler
Aug. 3, 2024
Wall Street Democrats have spent the last eight years complaining about their relationship with Washington. They found former President Donald Trump’s presidency unpredictable, and then became estranged from the Democratic Party as President Biden hired the most aggressive antitrust regulators in recent memory. But now that Vice President Kamala Harris is the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, they see a chance to regain influence.
Some have returned to a long tradition of writing checks, scheduling fund-raising dinners and orchestrating subtle campaigns. But others, embracing the public lobbying welcomed by Trump and employed by outspoken C.E.O.s like Elon Musk and Bill Ackman, are openly calling for Harris to oust Lina Khan, the chair of the Federal Trade Commission: “I think she’s a dope,” Barry Diller, the chairman of IAC, told CNBC. (He later apologized for calling her a dope, but not for critiquing her policies.)
Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn co-founder, spoke to CNN twice about his Khan concerns. “Antitrust is fine,” Hoffman said. “Waging war is not.” (He later clarified that he would support Harris regardless of whether she replaced Khan.)
Few on Wall Street would disagree with that stance — Khan has moved to block deals with seemingly little concern over losing in court. But behind the scenes, many are irked by this kind of public lobbying, arguing that it exposes a misunderstanding of the way the Washington game is played, and that it could backfire.
Their concerns are echoed by strategists: “I’m not really sure if it’s very effective,” Stuart Stevens, a political consultant who previously worked for Mitt Romney, told DealBook. “I’ve always felt once you make these things public, it makes it harder for politicians to do.”
Critics immediately called the public lobbying self-interested. The F.T.C. has reportedly opened multiple investigations that involve subsidiaries of Diller’s IAC, according to CNN, and Hoffman has a seat on the board of Microsoft, whose investment in OpenAI is also under scrutiny from the F.T.C.
“We didn’t see this in recent elections, because the Democratic Party was Wall Street-friendly on issues like antitrust and trade,” said Michael Sandel, a professor at Harvard and the author of “Democracy’s Discontent,” speaking about the public lobbying around Khan. “The Biden administration broke with these policies, which is why the donors are complaining.”
Khan’s detractors on Wall Street argue that their frustration is warranted. Deal activity has dropped precipitously under the Biden administration as regulators have demonstrated an eagerness to test the law by taking proposed mergers to trial.
But expressing the desire to oust Khan so publicly, some Wall Street insiders say, makes it nearly impossible for Harris to do so without it seeming as if she’s kowtowing to donor interests. It also reinforces Khan’s stature as a celebrity in her own right.
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Donor concern extends beyond Khan’s vocation. Not since Teddy Roosevelt has antitrust enforcement been a cornerstone election issue, and it is not clear it will be in 2024, either. But a clumsy approach could complicate Wall Street’s nascent relationship with a potential Harris administration, particularly if she views it as one that threatens her election chances.
Harris needs to win votes in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, where the administration’s antitrust policies and Trump-era tariffs remain popular.
“It seems to me that the last thing Kamala Harris needs is to take direction from plutocrat donors and cryptocurrency fans,” Chris Whipple, author of “The Fight of His Life: Inside Joe Biden’s White House,” told DealBook. “She should be listening instead to working-class voters in battleground states.”
The pressure campaign comes as Trump redeploys a winning tactic from 2016 by courting the populist vote. He invited Sean O’Brien, the president of the Teamsters union, to speak at the Republican National Convention. His pick for vice president, JD Vance, has applauded Khan’s take on big business.
Executives are increasingly becoming their own lobbyists. Companies typically try to influence antitrust policy behind closed doors. Google executives frequented the Obama White House during its antitrust investigation of the internet giant. Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google fortified their Washington presence during Trump’s presidency, spending millions on congressional calls, advertising and think-tank funding.
But Trump’s more blatantly transactional tenure was followed by a rise in public pleading, as Ackman, Musk and Silicon Valley billionaires have used social media to proclaim their political views on everything from the war in Ukraine to tax policy.
It’s “a continuation of social media where you have a forum that no thought can go unexpressed,” said Stevens. “This is what we used to pay lobbyists to do.”
Washington insiders prefer the art of subtle pressure. DealBook asked donors, lobbyists and insiders how they would pressure the vice president to replace Khan. Their hypothetical strategies involved highlighting economic studies that question Khan’s policies; enlisting support from organizations of smaller companies; and containing the ire that replacing Khan would provoke from progressive politicians like Senator Elizabeth Warren.
The latter is easier said than done, adding to the significant political and logistical challenges in replacing Khan.
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Those surveyed said a more easily achieved goal might be pushing for appointments in roles that could curb the administration’s antitrust priorities, like the director of the national economic council.
As for the potential political problem created by donors, a longtime Washington policy strategist, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized by his employer to speak publicly, had a recommendation.
“It’s a huge problem for Harris,” he told DealBook of public calls for Khan’s removal. He offered his thoughts on how the vice president should handle them: Reject executives publicly, and then tell donors privately, “Sorry, I had to do that.” — Lauren Hirsch
