DOJ Launches Task Force to Police ‘Anticompetitive’ Regulators
The Department of Justice wants to eliminate “anticompetitive” state and federal laws and regulations.
To that end, it announced the formation of the Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force in a Thursday (March 27) press release.
“The Antitrust Division has a long history of advocacy against laws and regulations that create unnecessary barriers to competition,” the release said. “The task force will surge resources to these efforts and invite public comments to support the administration’s mission to unwind laws and regulations that hinder business dynamism and make markets less competitive.”
The task force follows executive orders by President Donald Trump declaring that executive branch policy would require federal agencies to “alleviate unnecessary regulatory burdens placed on the American people,” and to review regulations in search of those that “impose undue burdens on small businesses and impede private enterprise and entrepreneurship,” per the release.
The Antitrust Division will conduct a public inquiry into “unnecessary laws and regulations,” with a focus on markets that have the largest impact on the American public, including housing, transportation, healthcare, and food and agriculture, according to the release.
The move comes as Trump’s party attempts to remake at least one regulatory body in Washington. Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee have called for a restructuring of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
At a Wednesday (March 26) hearing of the House Subcommittee on Financial Institutions, these critics contended that the agency has engaged in what they called “regulatory overreach.”
In his opening remarks, Rep. Andy Barr of Kentucky, chair of the subcommittee, said, “nowhere has overregulation and overreach” been as obvious as at the CFPB.
Earlier in the day, Barr proposed legislation that would restructure the CFPB, including the TABS Act, which would give Congress control of the agency’s funding.
Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Commission has been shifting its regulatory stance on the cryptocurrency sector, withdrawing or ending several cases against some of the industry’s most high-profile players.
“It’s a multifaceted demolition of the most successful SEC enforcement program in history,” John Reed Stark, an SEC enforcement attorney-turned-consultant, said in an interview with Bloomberg this month.
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