US Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan is set to face interrogation from House Republicans Thursday in a hearing slated to criticize Khan’s leadership of the agency.
The hearing before the House Judiciary Committee was planned to question Kahn about the FTC’s investigation into Elon Musk’s operation of Twitter, focusing on whether the company is adequately protecting user data.
Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, has characterized the investigation as politically motivated and as harassment of Musk, and has subpoenaed the FTC for documents concerning the probe.
Khan is also expected to face questions about her agency's dealings with the larger technology industry. The hearing comes just two days after a federal judge dealt a blow to the FTC’s lawsuit to block Microsoft's (MSFT) $69 billion acquisition of video game developer Activision Blizzard (ATVI).
In an order responding to the FTC’s request for an injunction, the judge said the commission didn’t make its case to show that the deal should be stopped from closing while the suit proceeds.
The FTC has filed an appeal to the ruling with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
“We’re disappointed that the FTC is continuing to pursue what has become a demonstrably weak case, and we will oppose further efforts to delay the ability to move forward,” Microsoft president Brad Smith said in a statement.
That lawsuit is one of several high profile antitrust and consumer protection cases brought by the Kahn-led FTC.
In June, the FTC sued Amazon (AMZN) claiming that the way the company operates its Prime subscription service violates consumer protection laws.
In February, a federal judge ruled against the FTC in favor of Facebook parent company Meta (META) in the agency’s lawsuit to block the company from acquiring virtual reality company Within.
In a separate suit, a federal judge said the FTC could file an amended complaint to move forward with an antitrust lawsuit to force Meta to divest some of its companies.
The agency is also expected to file a complaint against Amazon alleging that Amazon.com favors third party sellers who use its Amazon Logistics services to ship and fulfill orders.
According to the committee’s website, the hearing is intended to “examine mismanagement of the FTC and its disregard for ethics and congressional oversight under Chair Lina Khan.”
The committee members said they will also examine the Commission's record of enforcement actions, and what it claims are “politicized” FTC rule makings.
Ahead of the hearing, Big Tech industry group NetChoice issued a statement criticizing Khan and calling on Congress to restore accountability to the FTC.
"Chair Khan is frustrated because she is bound by American antitrust law, which requires her to use facts and evidence, rather than her own ideology about how the U.S. economy should operate," the group said in a statement
Khan, who was appointed as chair of the FTC at just 32 years old, made waves with her 2017 article for the Yale Law Journal titled "Amazon's Antitrust Paradox."
In the piece, Khan argues that the nation's current antitrust laws aren't capable of tackling the tech industry's anticompetitive behavior, and that they need to be rethought to bring Big Tech companies to heel.
Khan found support among both Democrats and Republicans during her confirmation hearing for the FTC, especially from Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), herself a critic of Big Tech and member of the House Antitrust Committee.
Alexis Keenan is a legal reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow Alexis on Twitter @alexiskweed.
