▶ 0:11:57and financial service and general government will come to order. This hearing is uh titled oversight of the US Federal Trade Commission. Members will have five legislative days with which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material into the record. I now recognize myself for an opening statement. I'd like to thank Chairman Ferguson for being here today and his leadership over the last several months. The Federal Trade Commission plays an important role in promoting marketplace competition and protecting consumers.
▶ 0:12:23Ensuring robust competition is vital to fostering economic growth while also lowering costs for all Americans. Over the last several years, under previous leadership, the FTC routinely strayed from its core mission and stretched the limits of its statutory authorities. I'm encouraged by the commission's renewed focus and direction under your leadership. Advances in technology and the emergence of artificial intelligence have presented new opportunities and challenges for businesses and consumers alike. American innovators are at the forefront of these major technological advances.
▶ 0:12:53While regulators have a responsibility to maintain common sense guard rails, they should do so in a way that does not stifle innovation and force good paying jobs overseas. The FTC's spending level for fiscal year 2025 was held flat from FY2024 at 425.7 million. Despite that flat funding for the last two fiscal years, the commission faces rising costs for expert witnesses, infrastructure, and technology.
▶ 0:13:18Furthermore, the recent passage of the Take It Down Act require the FTC to deploy additional resources to crack down on the publication of non-consensual intimate images, including those generated by AI. I look forward to hearing more about the commission's implementation of this important piece of legislation and the additional resources that will be required. Chairman Ferguson, you have described the Federal Trade Commission's role as a cop on a beat. Like police officers, the commission has a responsibility to enforce the law fairly without bias or prejudice.
▶ 0:13:46The American people deserve an FTC that sticks to its core mission of promoting competition and preventing fraud in the marketplace, providing regulatory certainty and predictability to the private sector, will spur an economic growth and benefit all Americans through affordable prices. I look forward to hearing from Chairman Ferguson about his vision for the commission and the resour resources that will be required to execute on the Federal Trade Commission's mission. I now recognize the ranking member, Mr. Hoyer, for his opening statement.
▶ 0:14:12Thank the chairman uh very much. Uh welcome chairman Ferguson to the committee. I want to thank you for the work that you have done and you are doing. Uh, you had a very extensive um, footnoted more than any other statement I think I've read for an opening statement.
▶ 0:14:37I thought I was reading a law brief, but having said that, it was very comprehensive, but one of the things I noticed in it, and I say this at the out, well, I'm going to ask questions later. U, I'm be going in and out. It has nothing to do with your testimony. It has to do with we have two hearings going on at the same time. One of my top priorities, Mr. chairman, as you know, throughout my time in Congress has been making our workers, our businesses, and our entire economy more competitive.
▶ 0:15:05Uh that's why I as majority leader started the the agenda that I call make it in America, which obviously is a double entandre. People came to America to make it to succeed, but also the way we're going to succeed better is to make it whatever it may be in America.
▶ 0:15:27uh we're moving towards that effort, but as you point out in your statement, it can be a self-defeating effort the larger one enterprise gets and other enterprises are left by the wayside. Many of the historic bills we passed in the 117th Congress, including the Chips and Science Act, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and the Inflation Reduction Act, were designed to promote competition and to grow manufacturing and our science uh research in
▶ 0:15:58America. That's the objective we ought to all share. If you support innovation, if you support growth, if you support development, then you have to support Uh, I tell my Democrats, uh, if you want to be proworker, you need to be pro- employer. Both need to be in equilibrium. Um, both have a role to play and both need a referee. You talked about cop on the referee.
▶ 0:16:29If you recognize the importance of the free market, as I do, then you have to recognize how crucial it is to keep it free and keep it a market. The FDC is essential to that mission to promote fair competition and protect American consumers. It breaks up monopolies that inflate the price of everything from groceries to gas to healthcare. It protects Americans from scam calls, fraud, and unfair business practices.
▶ 0:16:53It stands up for Americans privacy rights, going after businesses that misuse or fail to secure their personal data. One thing I may just it ticks me when I get advertisements that I don't ask for on this device which I own. Um I don't know whether there solution to that because obviously they got to pay for the product they give me in quotes. Um but that's a particular concern I have you may pay attention to.
▶ 0:17:23The FDC needs to maintain public trust and credibility to do this vital nonpartisan work. Now, I mentioned nonpartisan work, but what I was starting to say, let me say I notice uh at least three times in the in the opening sort of synopsis of your statement that you use the term uh the Trump Vance FTC.
▶ 0:17:53I was caught by that because I I don't see that very often in statements that are made. Actually, it's America's FTC. Now, you're appointed. You're you're Republican. I'm a Democrat, so we have different points of view, but we need to make sure the the uh the agenda of the administration uh really needs to be in this case, from your perspective, the agenda of what the FTC is intended to do.
▶ 0:18:18Now, we may have differences on that, but I would urge you to do it in as nonpartisan a way, and very frankly, I urge your predecessor to do the same thing. There would be different views as to whether that was accomplished. The FD needs to maintain public trust and credibility, as I said, and that will help.
▶ 0:18:38I think that's why the agency has always been I'm deeply concerned by this administration's efforts, frankly, to undermine not only the independence that that that naming it the Trump Bance FTC imply, but it also will creep is seems to be creeping into almost everything we do where so-called non-loyalists
▶ 0:19:09are being fired. uh they need to be loyal to the country and to the oath that we all take to the constitution and the laws thereof not to any individual or group of individual. In March, Donald Trump violated 90 years of Supreme Court president when he fired two Democratic FTC commissioners without any legal cause which under the law is required. Those two commissioners are challenging that action in court. I hope they win.
▶ 0:19:38And if it's anything like the dozens of other cases we've seen in the past four months, I believe the courts will likely rule against the administration. One more minute. Nevertheless, the Trump's attempt to politicize the FTC ought to concern us all.
▶ 0:19:56So should the reports that Elon Musk and his Doge agents may be able to access sensitive financial data the FTC compiles on American businesses, including Musk's competitors. That is the opposite of the FTC's purpose, and we must not let it happen. Democrats and Republicans need to come together to protect this vital institution, and ensure it has the resources it needs to keep serving the American people.
▶ 0:20:24I thank FTC Chair Ferguson for joining us today and I hope that he can address some of these concerns and speak to the importance of this funding. The American people are counting on the FTC and the FTC is counting on this committee. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Hoyer. Today, we welcome the testimony of the Honorable Andrew Ferguson, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. Chairman Ferguson, without objection, your full written testimony will be entered into the record.
▶ 0:20:52With that in mind, we ask you to please summarize your opening statement in five Thank you, Mr. Chairman, ranking member Hoyer, members of the subcommittee. I'm Andrew Ferguson, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, and I'm pleased to hear before you today to test about the testify about the FTC, its competition, and consumer protection priorities and how we are restoring the AY's financial health and public credibility. I'm also pleased to be joined by our newest commissioner, Mr. Mark Meadow. I was profoundly honored when President Donald J.
▶ 0:21:22Trump appointed me to lead the agency in January. President Trump's resounding victory in the 2024 election has given him a broad mandate to restore our economy. Restoring our econ economy requires a dynamic business environment characterized by increasing innovation, wages, productivity, and growth. The fruits of such an economy must be enjoyed by all Americans, particularly the backbone of our economy, our workers.
▶ 0:21:46Vigorous and effective consumer protection and competition law enforcement is key to facilitating a dynamic proworker economy. And I'm honored to be the chairman of the FTC under President Trump and to help drive this progrowth proworker agenda. I am also honored to run an agency that is filled with lawyers, economists, investigators, and professional staff who are tirelessly dedicated to the rule of law, to promoting competition, and to protecting consumers.
▶ 0:22:13They are the lifeblood of the FTC and we owe our success to them. We also confront challenges. Poor management decisions made by the previous administration have spread our resources thin. Thankfully, the measures we have taken to restore fiscal health to the FTC align with the president's directives to ensure that the agency is operating as efficiently and effectively as possible in the fulfillment of its mission to protect American people from monopolies and frauds. I resolutely believe in the mission of the FTC.
▶ 0:22:42No economic system in history has promoted the common good more than the American free enterprise system. No, no economic system has contributed more to human flourishing. But our free enterprise system promotes the common good of all Americans only if we protect it from anti-competitive business practices, anti-competitive consolidation and fraud. Without vigorous enforcement of our competition and consumer protection laws, our free enterprise system would benefit only the wealthy and the corrupt.
▶ 0:23:11For that reason, the Trump Vance FTC has gone back to the agency's roots. Vigorous enforcement of the law is our focus. Congress established the FTC to be a cop on the beat for our markets, not to make the rules. We enforce the laws that the people through their representatives in Congress have decided best promote competition and fairness. We investigate wrongdoing and if we believe violations of the law are taking place, we bring lawsuits. If we don't, we get out of the way and let markets promote innovation and growth.
▶ 0:23:42We seek to protect competition and combat fraud through vigilant, fair, and thorough investigations and litigation where necessary. The FTC is here to defend our free enterprise system and make it work for everyone. We want to protect Americans when they shop for groceries, when they go to the hospital, and when they speak online. My written testimony discusses in more detail the FTC's important work to protect US consumers and competition as well as a brief overview of the FTC's budget, resources, and cost-saving endeavors.
▶ 0:24:11Today, I will briefly highlight some of the AY's major recent activities and initiatives. We are focused on protecting Americans in the markets that affect them the most. That is why we have focused substantial resources on protecting Americans online. We have ongoing competition litigation against major big tech platforms under both the consumer protection and competition laws focused on healthcare markets.
▶ 0:24:34The first major competition action undertaken by the Trump Vance FTC was to enjoin a merger of medical device manufacturers that the commission alleges would have increased the prices of medical devices used by millions of Americans. I'm deeply concerned by the increasing prices across all of our healthcare markets. The FTC will do everything that it can to ensure that prices in healthcare markets are the product of vigorous competition and that our health care markets are free of deception and unfairness.
▶ 0:25:02We're also going beyond our law enforcement efforts in the health care space by using our section 6B authority to assat to examine the operations of the nation's pharmacy benefits managers, an industry that manages nearly 95% of all subscription prescriptions filled in the United States. As part of that probe, the FTC issued interim reports in July and Janu July 2024 and January 2025 on PBM markups of specialty generic drugs.
▶ 0:25:28There's still much work to be done on this report and I have made completing this report quickly and thoroughly one of the FTC's highest priorities. I look forward to presenting it to Congress when it is completed. We continue to focus on protecting vulnerable Americans from scams and frauds. The FTC has a long and proud history of protecting elderly Americans, veterans, and their families from scams and frauds through both education, outreach, and vigorous law enforcement. We're not taking our foot off the gas on that front.
▶ 0:25:58Similarly, protecting the vulnerable requires us to protect our children and teens as well. We are implementing an updated rule on the children's online privacy protection act and we'll be hosting a workshop entitled the attention economy how big tech hurt her big big tech firms exploit children and hurt families.
▶ 0:26:16This event will bring together parents child safety ef experts and leaders from across the federal government to discuss how big tech companies impose addictive design features erode parental authority and fail to protect children from exposure to harmful conduct. I look forward to hosting that in less than a month. Again, thank you for the opportunity to testify about the priorities of the FTC. We look forward to continuing to work with this subcommittee and with all of Congress. And I'm happy to answer your Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
▶ 0:26:45I now recognize uh for a initial question. Uh chairman, under the Biden administration, the FPC took an aggressive and unprecedented approach to enforcement and rulemaking. The commission stretches statutory authorities and at times look like a took a hostile view towards mergers and acquisitions under your leadership. How will the FTC make a different approach going forward or will you take a different one? And if yes, how? Uh Mr. Chairman, I agree with you.
▶ 0:27:13I think that the FTC under the previous administration had a bit of an ideological bend to get mergers and acquisitions. And my view is that mergers and acquisitions are a very critical part of how the economy grows and how we get innovation. Founders, innovators need access to capital and people will not invest in new ideas if they can't get their investments back. And mergers and acquisitions is part of how capital flows to innovators and innovators get their new ideas to us in the marketplace. So M&A is very important.
▶ 0:27:44At the same time, protecting Americans from monopolies and from anti-competitive conduct is very important and that's our job. So I see it as the FTC's mission is to serve as a cop on the beat in the M&A space. If we think that a deal is anti-competitive and we think we can win in court, we're going to go to court. And if we can't, we're going to get out of the way and we're going to get out of the way quickly. Congress set timelines by which we're supposed to examine M&A activity and we're going to stick by those timelines. That's on the front end.
▶ 0:28:13On the back end, a big change is that we are open to merger remedies at the FTC. My colleague Gail Slater at the Department of Justice has said the same thing. The previous administration prohibited uh remedies as a way to address anti-competitive conduct that didn't require blocking a whole merger. We are open to remedies negotiations with parties. The remedies have to be real. They have to be enforceable. and we have a strong preference for um structural remedies over behavioral remedies.
▶ 0:28:39But we in order to make sure that we are preventing as much anti-competitive conduct as we can, we have to recognize that sometimes we can eliminate anti-competitive features of mergers without blocking the whole thing and we have to be open to doing that. So on the M&A front, those are the biggest differences between the previous administration and the current one. Are there any specific enforcement actions or rulemakings that you're looking to um we tend not to discuss sort of the deliberations on that stuff.
▶ 0:29:05I wrote lots of dissents in the previous administration on both rulemakings and enforcement actions. Um and one of the things that we did when when President Trump was sworn in is that we did not accept on faith the lawfulness, reasonable reasonleness or or or the prudence of any ongoing enforcement matter or investigation and are conducting our own review top to bottom of everything that we inherited.
▶ 0:29:30If we think it's unlawful, if we think it's a poor use of agency resources, if we think it's inconsistent with administration priorities, then we will take steps to eliminate it, to change it, to align it with the law. If we don't, we will continue it. But particularly given that the FTC at the end of the Biden administration raced a huge amount of material out the door, we're conducting a thorough review and as we find things that we think are either unlawful or inconsistent with administration priorities, we will be changing them.
▶ 0:29:58Complex antirust cases such as the proposed Kroger Albertson's merger have required FDC to spend millions of dollars on expert witnesses in data storage and analytics. How much does the FDC spend on expert witnesses and data analytics each year? And are these growing costs inhibiting the commission's ability be to bring and successfully try antitrust cases? Um I it is not inhibiting our ability to do it, but it is a serious challenge that we're confronting. So, we have a Bureau of Economics at the commission with some of the country's most talented economists.
▶ 0:30:28They do unbelievable work both at the investigative stage and at the um litigation stage. We could not do our enforcement work without the Bureau of Economics. But a lot of our cases, not just big tech cases, a lot of our enforcement matters require us to onboard massive amounts of data in order to investigate potential wrongdoing and proceed to litigation where appropriate. um and we don't currently have the infrastructure to house, maintain and access those data in a meaningful way.
▶ 0:30:56So we end up paying vendors a lot of money to do that for us. Um we ran a pilot program at the end of the previous administration on ways to reduce those costs by bringing some of that infrastructure um internally was very successful. We've been working with other parts of the government to expand that pilot and make it programmatic at the FTC. On the expert front, you're right. Expert witnesses are expensive. Even with our very talented economists in the Bureau of Economics, we often have to hire industry specialist experts from outside the agency.
▶ 0:31:25We are imposing budgeting requirements within the agency for the first time as far as I know in the agency's history to make sure that at the outset of litigation, everyone knows what the agency is willing to spend and we constrain the agency to spend only those resources on litigation. that is going to help save us a lot of money by avoiding the ballooning problem at the end of litigation we've had in the past. Thank you. The chair now recognizes the lady, gentle lady from Washington, Mrs. Gluen Camp Perez for uh five minutes for any questions she may have.
▶ 0:31:55Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh and thank you uh Chair Ferguson for being here. I um appreciate the work you're doing and and um you know I before coming to Congress you might know I ran an auto repair and machine shop and care deeply about a level playing field for small businesses that is uh how we build wealth in this country is a a diversity and a level playing field. I think it's a lens of being pro business and antirust.
▶ 0:32:21And um one of the things that I've heard in your testimony is about um the expert witness testimony, but I've also had questions about how many people on staff in in your department that don't have a college degree because any of the mechanics I know could point to, you know, a headlight assembly and tell you that there's an issue going on when you can no longer replace a single light bulb and you have to do the entire assembly for $700 where we used to do it for three.
▶ 0:32:48And it's these kinds of things in the lens of I think experience of like what is what is important to people. Um there are big arguments and then there are the kind of the things that make or break a household budget and and those things I think are often best informed by having a plurality and a diversity of experience. And so I'm wondering how you are choosing to balance the um the credentiing of of your team.
▶ 0:33:14Um so I agree with you that having diverse experiences and viewpoints is super important for the FTC to do its work. I think for all government agencies there is an unfortunate bureaucratic impulse to sort of look only inside the beltway interact only with the interests that have inside the beltway presences and that generally small and medium-sized businesses will suffer as a result because they are the ones that can't go to the lobby shops in Washington and you know inundate Congress and the executive branch with lobbyists.
▶ 0:33:43So, I I certainly agree with you. We're a law enforcement agency and almost all of our work winds up in court, which means we end up being very lawyer heavy. We hire from law schools all across the country, even on the commission itself. Um uh we have two uh commissioners who graduated from SCA state schools. The previous administration had focused a little heavy on the Ivy Leagues for commissioners. I went to a state school. Um one of my colleagues went to a state school. We're from all over the country. That lends itself to diversity of experience.
▶ 0:34:12um and make sure that we don't get tunnel vision from within the beltway. Um so I I agree with you. It would be very easy to lose focus on the things that matter to Americans on the ground around the kitchen table without a diversity of experience and that is important to me at the FTC. Yeah, I think you know there's been arguments about needing a larger budget to be able to expand the staff, but I think it is about the prioritization of how how um respect who who deserves a seat at the table and identifying and prioritizing the experiences.
▶ 0:34:42One of the things that um I've been looking at, you know, if you I don't know. Um my washing machines from 1987. Um but a lot of a lot of the newer ones, it's like they're playing Shaikovski and they don't last more than, you know, six years and and there's very clear design issues and why that's happening.
▶ 0:35:00um having more information as a consumer about what the expected life expect what the life expectancy, what the annual maintenance cost, those kinds of um ways to get at not building more agency, more bureaucracy, but saying let's people just deserve the right to have more clarity of information.
▶ 0:35:17and would certainly appreciate um you know your um your support in in identifying some planned obsolescence strategies as well as um you know offiscation of the durability of a given product might be your thoughts on that? I'd love to work with you on it. Look, the the FTC's most important consumer protection mission is preventing deception. And deception under section five is not just straight out lies.
▶ 0:35:45It's also omitting things that would be important and material to a consumer before he or she decides to purchase something. Um, and misrepresenting either intentionally or through omission the lifespan of a product is potentially a problem. So, I'm more than happy to work with you on that on industries where you think that's a particular problem and require our focus. Uh, you go to McDonald's? Uh, not often but sometimes. Yes. Yeah. You know, you know about the issue with the with the ice cream machines.
▶ 0:36:12I am aware that it is sometimes difficult to get a McFlurry uh when you want it. Um well, I've appreciated the work that has happened um to ensure that people who are buying equipment have the right to fix it. Whether we're talking about a car, an ice cream machine, I think there's some very uh embedded paternalistic attitudes towards who has the right in the agency and what a material environmentalism, an applied environmentalism is in making things that last longer and having clarity for the owners.
▶ 0:36:42This tort law goes back to the 1400s. You bought it, you have the right to fix it and maintain it. And um I'm hoping that uh we are seeing a continuous a continuation of that and a seriousness of building wealth and economic self-determination in America. My my grandfather had a a Ford tractor from the 1950s with which he tinkered up until his death. So I and I grew up in a farming community.
▶ 0:37:06So I understand particularly to farmers the importance of being able to repair your equipment um without having to go back to the manufacturer. We have an ongoing case against John Deere on this issue. This is also an issue that the states have started to address legislatively. I know that there have been lots there have been legislation Congress has passed on this front. Other legislation considered um in so far as you know preventing someone from repairing violates section five. I'm we are prepared to enforce it.
▶ 0:37:34We also want to recognize that generally the best approach to problems is to let the people's representatives both in the state legislatores and in Congress address it first and so we don't want to sort of interfere with those efforts. But this this issue is important to me. I grew up around this issue. I hear you loud and clear. Thank you. Yield back. Thank you. Thank you. Chair now recognizes the distinguished gentleman from Arkansas, Mr. W. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And uh Mr. Chairman, welcome. Uh you're a breath of fresh air.
▶ 0:38:03I got to say that uh in my words in my strong opinion in the the administration was more agendad driven and in listening to your testimony this morning and then in our private conversation u you seem to have the view that your job is like that of an umpire of a of a referee to make sure
▶ 0:38:33that um you are uh the the the people and the institutions that are subject to your purview accountable. Um and and again my words uh certainly not yours.
▶ 0:38:51And so it's from that standpoint that uh that that I think uh you're on the right course of getting the FTC back to uh to the nuts and bolts, the blocking and tackling if you will of what the commission was set up for. I do have a a question about budget though when when we had our conversation uh and these are appropriators up here so it's our job to to fund the discretionary side of government and yours is part of that.
▶ 0:39:19uh we don't have clarity right now and we need clarity. Um my assumption is and I want to be clear that it's just an assumption that um there will be many agencies that will be u facing some budget adjustments, some cuts if you will.
▶ 0:39:38And where is the FTC right now with regard to the prospect of having to settle for less and be able to continue to function as a reputable institution within uh within the government? The agency that I inherited even at current funding levels was in a very difficult position. The previous administration had hired employees at levels far beyond what we were what we could afford. Would you call it bloated? Uh it it was bloated.
▶ 0:40:08There was like a two-year hiring spree that got us to levels that we couldn't sustain. Um and so it was important to me coming in as chairman to sort of make the difficult decisions necessary to restore fiscal health to the agency.
▶ 0:40:23Um and so um as the president has, um consistent with what he ran on in the 2024 election, oriented the government towards efficiency and being no larger than necessary to carry out its critical missions for the American people, we were already well underway on getting the agency down to a size consistent with what this body had appropriated us. Um and so we we were sort of ready to go on that front, consistent with the president's agenda as well.
▶ 0:40:51We've been conducting a thorough review of our contracting. We've already reduced contract spend for this fiscal year by more than $6 million. Um so we are position we also as I discussed earlier are undertaking um steps that we are very optimistic about that will over the course of the next several years shrink the amount of money we have to pay outside vendors to house our data in some of our big and important investigations and litigations.
▶ 0:41:16So, we are well on our way to being prepared for whatever budget this committee decides to appropriate for the FTC. You know, that runs counter to what a lot of agency heads would would suggest. They they need more money. They they need more people. They need more resources. Um it sounds to me like that you feel like you can uh the FTC can do its job. Uh and that's that's a testament to the FTC staff.
▶ 0:41:42I would put the FTC staff up against the staff of any agency, civilian or federal, in the federal government. Um, and whatever this committee decides to appropriate the commit to the commission, American consumers will be protected by our staff. Good. Um in in uh the president's executive order, agency heads in cons consultation with the FTC chair and the US attorney general complete a review of all agency regulations under their rulemaking authority and determine which rules create anti-competitive barriers.
▶ 0:42:12How how do you plan to execute antitrust enforcement in recognition of this particular executive order? I I President Trump has put out a bunch of amazing amazing executive orders. I'm not sure I'm as excited about any of them as I am on this one. So, when we talk about competition in America, we generally think about monopolies and consolidation and price fixing, which is appropriate. Um, but one of the biggest obstacles to competition, particularly to small and medium-sized businesses, is regulation.
▶ 0:42:42And, you know, I worked on the Hill, I've seen it in action. I've worked in state government. I've seen it in action. Big businesses will often come into the government and propose regulations that they can comply with quite quite easily, but that make it very difficult for competitors to rise and challenge them. And the president's executive order tells us, look through the entire code of federal regulations, find regulations that are barriers to entry that raise rivals costs and get them out of there. So, we put out an RFI to the public.
▶ 0:43:10We said if you especially small businesses if you are aware of regulations that benefit your competitors but make it harder for you to compete tell us. We will review them. We will make recommendations to the president. We also sent letters to every agency head and the federal government asking them to do the same thing. We will have economists and lawyers at both the Department of Justice and the FTC reviewing these regulations as they are identified to us. And I'm very excited when we eventually send the list to OMB and the president on our recommendations for descoping and deletion. Yeah.
▶ 0:43:37one one final comment because I may not be around for if we have a second round of questions and I want to be able to say this in regard to what you just discussed and that is I'm sure hopeful that among those things that are considered uh in this uh context is uh section 1071 of the DoddFrank Act because that is in and Miss Gloocamp Perez uh and and I both agree that this small business side of the equation is where the jobs are created and where we need to be uh creating emphasis
▶ 0:44:08uh as far as the FTC goes, but that's one that is very punitive to uh uh you know to to our banking community. So I I applaud you for the work that you're doing. Uh keep it up and we look forward to getting your budget. Thank you. Uh thank you, sir. Uh the chair now recognizes the gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Ivy, for five minutes of questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh good morning, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you for appearing here today.
▶ 0:44:37Uh I I appreciate uh your opening comments. Uh I look forward to the um report you're going to come back with with respect to PBMs. I think it's a a very important issue. It's also a very complicated issue. So adding your insight uh your agency's insight will be especially helpful.
▶ 0:44:57Um, I didn't follow the medical device uh merger issue in in detail, but I was uh pleased to see that um you were open to enjoining a merger. Your opening comments, I think, reflect the fact that you're trying to call the balls and strikes, that you're not trying to be ideological about it. I I appreciate that. Continuing the ongoing litigation with big tech, I thought was interesting uh as well.
▶ 0:45:24And I believe you well the FTC uh upheld the uh the junk fees I'll call it um determination which I think is important. I think it's really one of those things that's tremendously helpful to people across the board. Uh and I do want to join with uh my colleague from Washington State on the the right to repair issue. I I think that's one that um is very important. you know, businessto business conflicts. That's one thing, but you know, a lot of these scenarios, we have individuals.
▶ 0:45:53You talked about a farmer owning a tractor with respect to John Deere, and I know that's ongoing, but um that's the kind of scenario we I think we we really need you to step up and make sure that people are protected uh so that they can just take care of basic things, run their business or or take care of their their appliances. McDonald's. I'm not a big McFlurry guy, but uh you know, if they get a break along the way, that's fine.
▶ 0:46:17Click to cancel is another one uh that I think is could really be helpful to a lot of people across the board. I know every time I try and cancel something that uh frequently one of my kids signed up for it takes forever to do it. You know, you can sign up in a minute, but getting out of it um can take half of a lifetime. So, I I appreciate anything you can do on that front as well. Um I I do want to say this there with respect to the um non-compete issue.
▶ 0:46:48Um I I think that uh and you you open by talking about the importance of workers um and how they're the the backbone of the economy and you want to take a proworker approach. The the non-compete piece in my experience when I was um corporation to corporation, no poaching, that kind of stuff. I get it.
▶ 0:47:09But there's a lot of times where you have workers, individuals who really don't have negotiating uh capability with respect to larger corporations um and they want to try and move to do another uh job or or you know find other types of employment might have some situation where you know beyond their control. Um and these clauses can really get in the way and hamstring them.
▶ 0:47:32And I think I I I I took a look at your your descent on um on that issue and I appreciate your views on it. I know a lot of that's procedural. Um and and uh I I don't mean to belittle that, but this is a very important restriction on what regular people can do from an employment standpoint. And I hope that you'll be able to find a way to address that with respect to uh people who don't have that kind of power.
▶ 0:48:01they can't hire the big lobbyists as you mentioned. Um, and I I I want to close with this and I know this is ongoing litigation as well. The uh termination of Commissioner Slaughter and Bedoya um as you know caught a lot of people's attention that would include me. Uh and I know it's um still kind of in in court just getting underway. But one of the things that concerned me about that was it didn't appear that there were any grounds for the termination.
▶ 0:48:31Um now I note that you issued a statement uh with respect to it. um I think on the day they were terminated and in the statement you issued you didn't reference the standard uh for termination inefficiency neglective duty or malfeence in office and I I I you know you supported the termination but not on statutory grounds not on legal grounds and I I
▶ 0:49:01think that's pretty significant especially given your background um I took it I took a looked at your 40page descents. I Supreme Court clerk, you mentioned being from a state school. You didn't mention it was UVA, which is a little more than a regular state school. Um, I'll appreciate you saying that. Well, my brother will too, but but you know, my my larger point though is, you know, you didn't hit on the law in the statement that you gave.
▶ 0:49:26you're a defendant in the case, so I know you'll have a chance to explain your position at length, but I think it's important for us to make sure we understand that independent commissions are supposed to be independent. President certainly has the authority to make appointments and as you pointed out, he just did, but there's supposed to be a a partisan balance to these and those terminations upset that balance from a statutory standpoint. So, um you're in the middle of the case.
▶ 0:49:55Um, I want to commend you overall in general for a lot of the positions you've taken and I look forward to working with you going Thank you. Uh, chair now recognizes the gentle lady from Iowa, Miss Henson, for any questions she may have. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, good morning, Mr. Chairman. Thank you so much for coming before our committee to testify and for uh the great work that you and you mentioned the incredible staff that you have at the FTC who are keeping American consumers protected. I I really appreciate that great work that you're doing.
▶ 0:50:25Um, obviously holding the bad actors accountable and ensuring that we have a uh uh a system that doesn't burden our small businesses with excessive regulations um remains a priority. I'm really excited to hear that we share that priority. Uh, one area that, um, I think is a raging example of that is the pharmacy benefit managers.
▶ 0:50:44And I know there's already been discussion about that report this morning, but I think uh, people are getting fed up of seeing people profit off of sick Americans um, and pushing many of these independentarmacies in small rural communities like many in my district out of business. Um, and just this week, we actually had a fellow Ian um, and president of the American Pharmacist Association, Dr. Randy Mcdana. He testified in front of Senate Judiciary Committee this week um that in Iowa alone, 200ies have closed since 2014.
▶ 0:51:13A record 31ies closed in in 2024. I mean, those numbers are staggering to me when we think about access to health care, access to those life-saving drugs. Um really really important that we we find a solution here. The FTC obviously released the interim report in January uh revealing that the the big three PBMs uh impose markups of hundreds of thousands of percentages uh on numerous specialty generic drugs dispensed at their affiliated.
▶ 0:51:39So um I think we're all uh trying to wrap our heads around how they've been able to get away with this for this long. Can you talk a little bit about the FTC's plans to uh not only continue but ultimately complete this study and uh release that final report? Absolutely. um the commission has gotten uh huge quantities of data from uh the PBMs and the um GPOS uh and you know we we are going through it.
▶ 0:52:05I think it's very in my view, as I said in my concurrence to the first interim report, it was a bit rushed. Um the the work was not the FTC's best substantial improvement in the second interim report. My view is that whatever we next produce needs to be a very very thorough accounting of all the data we have um and of all the issues it presents so that legislators here in Congress and in the states um and policy makers throughout the federal government and the state governments have our full understanding of what is going on in
▶ 0:52:35these incredibly complicated markets. So we are devoting a ton of resources to getting this done. I want it done as quickly as possible but I do not want speed to be the enemy of thoroughess. So, we're trying to sort of thread the needle to make it as thorough, comprehensive as possible. Um, which includes interacting with PBMs to hear their side of the story um while also making sure that we have a full understanding of what's actually going on in these markets and that you all have it as soon as possible. We have other um PBM matters ongoing.
▶ 0:53:05Um, this is all public, but we we took um, Kmark to court in the District of Columbia just a couple months ago because they were um, refusing to comply with some of our orders in a law enforcement investigation and we won. They were ordered to comply. Um, that was a significant win not just for our PBM investigation, but for our sort of investigative authority across the board and we have an ongoing um, administrative adjudication involving PBMs and Insulin.
▶ 0:53:30It's difficult for me to talk about that one because I sit as a judge in the course of that proceeding but this is this is one of our critical priorities at the FTC but because health care is one of our critical priorities. Everyone participates in healthcare markets and the prices in healthcare are going up across the board and the rate at which people have to use the healthcare markets is also going up across the board and you know I don't think competition is a panacea to the health care cost crisis in this country but at least the FTC can make sure
▶ 0:54:01that everyone is competing within the bounds of the laws that Congress has passed and that is what we are focused on. Yeah, this is about a level playing field and protecting consumers at the same time. And I think that um my I think all of us policy makers are are trying to get to a point where we figure out how did we get here in the first place, right?
▶ 0:54:18So I don't know if you have any insight in that when you think about the FTC's job to protect consumers and here we are, you know, decades into this experiment with PBMs and and uh we've we've kind of um opened Pandora's box, I And to your point about um you know trying to be thorough here, time is of the essence because we are seeing states take action. My own home state of Iowa just passed um they just ended their legislative session I think at like 6:30 this morning, but they just passed uh Senate File 383. It's one of the most comprehensive uh state level PBM reforms in the country.
▶ 0:54:48And so um I mean do you have any insight on just overall observations on how we got here uh and why these steps were not being taken along the way? So, I I I have my suspicions, but I don't want to get ahead of the report. I I sort of want the FTC's work, having analyzed all the data, to be our definitive statement on this. So, if you'll permit me, I I I will let the report when it is ready for release to Congress, sort of speak on this.
▶ 0:55:13I also think it's important I I think state and federal legislative action to address problems that may be posed by PBMs are good. It is always better for the people's representatives to confront the people's problems rather than sort of deferring to the bureaucrats. I think the report will be very helpful as Congress and the state legislators are trying to figure out what to do. But I I I think we should all welcome legislative action on this because you all understand the needs of your constituents better than anybody else, including their relationships with the PBMs. Yes.
▶ 0:55:42And uh the need for lowerc cost prescription drugs for sure. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, for coming. Appreciate it. I yield back. Thank you. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr. Pokean, for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, and thank you for being here today. Sorry I missed the opening testimony. We have, you'll see standing here in a second, battling uh hearings going on. Um, you know, one of the things I think that I really appreciated about uh former chair Lena Khan was keeping the FTC independent. And you've mentioned that a number of times.
▶ 0:56:12Um, in 2023, you testified to the Senate during your confirmation process that if confirmed as an FTC commissioner, I'll abide abide by binding Supreme Court precedent. And then you went on to site Humphrey's executive versus United States as the president that you'd support. As you know, that case upheld the independence of the FTC and specifically limited the president's ability to remove a commissioner.
▶ 0:56:36Um, well, the president uh has illegally fired two of your fellow commissioners and you went on to publicly support his actions. On March 18th, you said that quote, "Uh, President Trump is vested with all of the executive power in our government. I have no doubts about his constitutional authority to remove commissioners." So, that's in direct conflict with what you said when you testified before the Senate 2023. So, what is accurate?
▶ 0:57:03what you said when you were under oath in front of the Senate or what you said most recently when Donald Trump broke the law. I'm a defendant in that litigation, but I I I can tell you what the brief said because the brief is filed in my name. Yeah. And I'd like to get to three subjects during my time. So, yeah. Thank you. Sure. Humphrey's executive is is good law. It governs the removal protections for the 1935 FTC.
▶ 0:57:26As I'm sure you know as well as I do, the 2025 FTC has orders of magnitude more authority than the 1935 FTC. And what the Supreme Court said in 2020 in CIA law is that the Humphre executive exception does not apply to federal agencies that wield substantial executive. So the question I had is which was the accurate statement. Both of them are accurate. What I said what I said in 2023 is Humphre's executive is good law which is true as is CEA law the Supreme Court's definitive 2023. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
▶ 0:57:55I'd like to enter into the record just the comments from that Senate hearing just so I can have it uh entered as well without objection. Thank you very much. Okay. Um so hopefully we can get two more subjects at two. I'm going to do as fast as I can. I apologize. Uh last year the FTC uncovered in the proposed merger between Exon Mobile and Pioneer Natural Resources. Pioneer CEO Scott Sheffield conspired with a foreign entity OPEC to raise gas prices for Americans.
▶ 0:58:23Uh this price fixing likely costs consumers $2 to $4,000. It's been estimated in 2021. After learning of this illegal scheme, the FTC allowed the Exxon uh Pioneer merger, but prohibited Sheffield from serving on the board or advising the new company in any way. Rightfully so. In March, after donating massive amounts to President Trump's election campaign, Mr. Sheffield asked the FDC under your leadership to reopen and alter, modify, or set aside the orders against him.
▶ 0:58:51Unfortunately, uh it seems that it has been reopened at this point, uh obliging to his request. I know that the commission just wrapped up a public comment period on this, of which I submitted a letter of opposition to that. Um could you please let us know how allowing an alleged price fixer who actively colluded with a foreign entity, OPEC, uh should be put on the board of Exxon, and how that aligns with FTC's mission of protecting consumers and promoting competition.
▶ 0:59:20I I dissented from both of those orders dating back to May 2024. We did not first of all, we did not proceed on the basis of evidence of price fixing. We accused him of making comments and that was it. Number one, and number two, my I don't care if Mr. Sheffield ever serves on that board. I do care that the FTC rigidly follows the law, including section 7. We had never articulated a section seven theory of that kind before. We had never issued an order of that kind before.
▶ 0:59:46And I my concern remains that it was done in response to dozens of letters from Democratic legislatores legislators filed with the committee while we were considering that merger and that it was politically motivated. I want the FTC to follow the law. And to be clear, I didn't reopen the proceeding. The APA requires that I reopen the proceeding if I'm asked. I just again I think it would run counter to what both you've said and what Donald Trump has said about lowering costs.
▶ 1:00:12So hopefully we won't allow this guy who's colluded with hundreds of messages to a foreign entity to get on a board and rip off consumers ever again. Lastly, in 30 seconds really quick, an area I don't know if you've ever covered, but I'm checking in um Medicare Advantage plans. Uh four companies represent something like 75 80% of the the market out there. Um, one of the complaints I think we all get from constituents are people have to uh get permission to have uh medical care and you don't have to do that with Medicare.
▶ 1:00:42They get turned down. When those are appealed, only 1 to 3% appeal, the appeal rate gets overturned is 85%. That's clearly like they're turning down uh so many cases that need coverage. Is that something that potentially you guys could look at? because again a few companies seem to be of consolidation in the market and when that rate is so high 85% I'd love to know what you your thoughts are on that.
▶ 1:01:09I'm not familiar with the issue but I would be more than happy to to work with you on it. Your staff should reach out to my staff and we're happy to talk with you about this. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. Edwards for any questions he may have. Thank Thank you, Mr. Chair.
▶ 1:01:27Chairman Ferguson, in 2019, the HCA Healthc Care uh that's in North Carolina's Mission Health for 1.5 My constituents in western North Carolina were promised that this acquisition would result in lower patient costs.
▶ 1:01:46But after the merger, prices rose higher than the average list prices of the 11 neighboring hospitals and annual markup prices nearly doubled to an average of 33 percentage points a Patients have also experienced a lower quality of health care with a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services report finding that at least three patients died and more were endangered at the merged hospital
▶ 1:02:16in uh 2022 and 2023 due to significant weight times, delays, negligence, and lapse of care. Despite this significant decline in quality of care, Mission's patient care profits were almost 100 million in 2022, three and a half times higher than its profits the year before the acquisition.
▶ 1:02:41Chairman Ferguson, um, in our previous meeting, you expressed similar concerns regarding the increasing prices of healthc care in rural areas as a result of private entity rollups and mergers. During your tenure as FTC chairman, what actions can and will you take to protect competition within the healthcare industry? I I enjoyed our discussion, Congressman Edwards.
▶ 1:03:11Um, as we discussed and as I've discussed, going back to my confirmation hearing. Um, rural health healthcare in particular is super important to me. I grew up rural um and saw a company come in and buy up a lot of physician practices and so I've seen the effects of it. Um, the commission has a pretty remarkable track record of policing hospital mergers. We don't get them all right, but we're it's one of the things the commission is better at um than almost anybody, you know, anything else that it does.
▶ 1:03:40Um I know you've asked for a briefing on the HCA merger, and I think we we've set it up with you in terms of what we can do. So, my first the commission's first enforcement antitrust enforcement action since I became chair was in the healthcare industry. It was to uh block a merger of two medical device manufacturers that we allege would have increased prices. Um, we have ongoing litigation involving PBMs. We have the PBM report.
▶ 1:04:05Um, and uh, you know, I think continuing to make sure we've also advocated against certificates of public advantage in states that allow hospital. So, in the in your interest of time, respectfully, he's only going to give me five minutes. What uh what can what can you do going forward to ensure that uh, rural health care in America is protected? We we will continue to police hospital mergers as effectively as we've done for the last two decades.
▶ 1:04:33How how can you use your role as a federal regulator now to review the HCA and Mission healthcare merger and take the necessary actions to reverse it if you determine that it's inhibited competition within the healthcare industry in western North Carolina. The commission doesn't approve mergers. If the commission declines to bring enforcement action, it isn't an approval. So, the commission always continues to monitor competitive effects in markets even after there are mergers that are not blocked.
▶ 1:05:00Um, I'm happy to work with you and your staff and my staff are as well uh to understand the effects that the mergers had on on rural North Carolina. Thank you. I appreciate that. And in the interest of time, I'm going to accept that offer and uh and and and let's work together.
▶ 1:05:15Now, I'd like to ask uh I'm I'm informed that you may intend to file an amicus brief in a uh Texas Attorney General's case that would, if successful, cause asset managers to defest from the coal industry. Can you speak to that real quick? Is that is that true?
▶ 1:05:35So there uh the state of Texas along with a coalition of Republican attorneys general brought a lawsuit against asset managers and accused them of having driven up the price of energy by driving down output in coal and oil. Um which if true is sort of a shocking horrible thing that has been inflicted on all of us by driving up our energy prices. Um uh I have we have monitored us in the department of justice have monitored this case closely.
▶ 1:06:02I think this was an important and groundbreaking breaking case brought by Attorney General Paxton. Um and if true um could potentially, you know, remedy increasing energy prices by making sure that asset managers can't collude to drive down output and increase prices and and so real quick because I'm running out of time. How does that support President Trump's energy policy?
▶ 1:06:25Uh, President Trump has made it one of his chief priorities to unleash American energy so that prices for energy go down, which promotes growth, makes it easier for all of us to put gas in our cars. The accusation in that case is that asset managers were colluding in secret to drive up our energy prices. That is exactly the sort of thing the antitrust laws are designed to protect all Americans from. Um, and we have monitored this case very closely. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I must yield. I'm out of time. Thank you, Mr. Edwards.
▶ 1:06:56Chair now recognizes the ranking member for any questions he may have in five minutes. Thank you very much, Chair Mr. Pokeian and I are playing tag team here. Um, Chair Ferguson, I'm concerned this committee's ability to fund the department agents in our bill, including the FTC. U but I want to ask you about the staffing levels. Um, the FTC is already down, as I understand it, 1,221 FTEEs. Is that accurate?
▶ 1:07:25I do believe that is our current number. Yes, sir. Uh and there is a goal to get go even lower. Is that accurate? We are trying you're still trying to reduce we are trying to get our employee levels down to a level we can actually afford given our current appropriation. Yes. And what what level is that? Um uh because this is largely being driven by attrition rather than layoffs, it's difficult to predict exactly where it's going. But we are trying to get down around the 1100 range.
▶ 1:07:55When you say attrition, are you calling the fork in the road and voluntary retirements uh attrition? Yeah, we it when I inherited the agency, it was very clear that we had more employees than we could possibly afford. We were using carryover funds to pay our employees. That is not sustainable. That's not responsible. Um, but I wanted to get the agency to healthy employee levels without having to do layoffs.
▶ 1:08:23And so we've offered deferred res the deferred resignation program again. We've offered Vera and VSIP across the entire agency to try to get us to a healthy um full-time employee level without having to do layoffs. Now uh has there been a study done on what the appropriate level when you say healthy level presumably and and as I said at the beginning I don't know that I've read a more detailed uh opening statement
▶ 1:08:54u and and as I said fully uh noted at the at the bottom of almost every page. So you've done a lot of studies, but is there a study that you could provide for the committee which says uh what the appropriate level of funding is to meet the uh very numerous objectives that you outlined in your statement that you want to achieve?
▶ 1:09:20I can't identify a study, but what I can say is that the levels that this committee chooses to fund us, we will maximize the American taxpayers's return on investment. we consistently send back to the treasury and to consumers billions of dollars um either in the form of lower prices or recovered unjust enrichment from fraud. Um and no matter what this committee funds us at, we will keep doing that which is just a testament to the fact that the FTC has in my view the best civilian staff in the federal government.
▶ 1:09:48So look, our the appropriate healthy funding or level of employees is driven by funding decisions this committee makes. But whatever funding decision this committee makes, we will maximize your return on investment. Well, we made a decision. We made a decision in fiscal year 24. We reaffirm that in fiscal year 25, the CR and now you're every one of them was offered early out and to be paid through September 30th.
▶ 1:10:17Every one of them your employees which whom you have just said are outstand and you said that in your statement which I appreciate. I represent, by the way, 77,000 federal employees. Um, and so I appreciate that statement, which I think is accurate. Uh, why would we send every one of those people, because clearly some of them must be necessary to accomplish the objectives you set forth in your statement, a notice you can leave and get paid through September 30th.
▶ 1:10:47Because we could not afford to pay all of our employees at the levels Congress had appropriated us. The previous administration hired radically more people than we could afford to pay and we were eating into carryover funds just to cover payroll which is deeply irresponsible way to run an agency. My goal was to get and remains to get the agency to healthy employee levels in light of the money that Congress appropriated the agency. Let me repeat my question. What is the healthy level? The healthy level is what we're aiming for which is in the No, no, no, no.
▶ 1:11:17I know that's what you're aiming for. That's your objective. What is a healthy level given the the very important work that you outline in your statement? What is the level that you recommend you should have comport with your dollars available to you and the uh work that you have. So in light of the dollars available to me the number we've been discussing around 1100 is the healthy level because that's the affordable level in terms of accomplishing our mission.
▶ 1:11:46We can accomplish the mission with 1100 employees. I have no doubt about it because our people are really really good. We have shifted our priority especially away from rulemaking which is time and resource intensive back toward law enforcement and are moving resources in that way and that is the priority of this administration. It's my priority and we have the employees to do that. Okay. And is your your request is an FTE level 1100 to be funded to 1100. Is that your request?
▶ 1:12:15Uh uh so given the current status of I know we have a skinny budget at this point in time so that's you may or may not be able to so I'm not in a position to discuss the the specifics but what I'm saying is 1100 is healthy given the current CR funding level and we will get the job done period. Okay. Well I'm I'm a little over time. I'm not sure what you mean given the current funding level.
▶ 1:12:38What I really want to know, and maybe you can do for the record, is what level do you think you need to accomplish the objectives you set forth in your statement? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You'll have another round, too. Oh, good. And chair, now recognizes the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Bishop, for any for five minutes of his questions. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Um, welcome, uh, Chairman Ferguson.
▶ 1:13:01I've been hearing from my constituents numerous complaints about the practices of the pharmacy benefit managers uh which they say are driving up the prices of drugs making it harder for small independentarmacies to stay open particularly in rural areas where pharmacies are fewer and farther between.
▶ 1:13:20Uh over the past couple of decades, the FTC has allowed vertical integrations within healthcare, leaving only a few companies that that not only own PBMs, but also own pharmacies and other healthcare facilities. Uh these uh big companies have become uh powerful and they often threaten small independents with contract termination if they don't confirm to reimbursement models and rules.
▶ 1:13:46So, I'm very pleased that the FTC has taken action uh to enforce uh uh the law on it and to address the PBM excesses. Uh does the FTC in your judgment have sufficient resources and will this budget give you sufficient resources to address what appears to be a large issue for the affordability of prescription drugs? Uh I I agree with you especially on the concern about PBMs in rural communities.
▶ 1:14:15Just a couple months ago, I went and visited a decades old independent pharmacy in rural central Virginia, very near where I grew up, and sat with the owner for about an hour, and just listen to him explain the situation in which he finds himself. And independenties are super important to small towns. If you drive down the main street of a small town, post office, a church, a restaurant or two, and the pharmacy. and pharmacies independentarmacies in particular for for rural communities that's often the gateway to health care.
▶ 1:14:45The pharmacist often participates in in an individual citizens healthcare decisions. So protecting independentarmacies is critically important. Um as I discussed earlier we have the ongoing 6B study to which I'm devoting substantial resources as well as law enforcement. We have the resources to complete the 6B study. We have the resources to carry on law enforcement.
▶ 1:15:05Part of that has to do with shifting resources away from rulemaking which I don't think the FTC should generally be but you're also engaged in litigation and of course I know you can't discuss the specifics of the litigation but are you actively pursuing that litigation to make sure Congressman okay thank you very much on that let me try to reclaim my time and talk about uh uh our grocerers and ourarmacies uh under the helm of chairman Khan uh the FTC C
▶ 1:15:35filed the first Robinson Patman Act enforcement action in decades. And I've heard from independent grocerers in my district that have had a hard time competing in rural environments uh because of the spending power of their bigger competition. Uh in far too many cases, grocery stores have had to close because of a lack of profitability uh leaving behind broad swats of food deserts uh in rural America. And 50% of my district is rural.
▶ 1:16:03Can you give me an update on the FTC's enforcement of the Robinson Pacman Act and what future plans you have for enforcement of this federal law and whether or not within the sphere of what you asking for for resources you will have those? U so we have two ongoing litigation and I can't obviously discuss the specifics of the litigation. Um I've written pretty extensively on the Robinson Patman Act as a minority commissioner. I think that the decision that the government made in the 1970s to quit enforcing it was bad. Um it is a law.
▶ 1:16:32It is a law passed by Congress. The executive branch's job is to enforce the laws passed by Congress, even if there isn't full agreement on the policy underlying those laws. I do think, however, it is very important that when the FTC brings Robinson patentment enforcement actions that it doesn't do it in a way that could elevate the costs that consumers have to pay for goods, which is a risk when you bring Robinson Patton enforcement cases.
▶ 1:16:55And so my view is that if the commission should not bring Robinson Patman Act cases unless we know that the beneficiaries of the discrimination have market power that they can use to hurt consumers. I think that's the time that the commission should bring Robinson Patman Act cases. So because my job is to enforce laws that you this body has passed I am open to bringing Robinson Patmanac cases. But like I said in a previous descent, we have to do it only in circumstances where we are very confident we will not be raising prices.
▶ 1:17:25You're not confident of that that that's the case. Now, well, it it I think it depends on particular markets and particular market participants. I'm open to bringing these cases. I'm open to using resources, but I'm not going to bring cases unless I'm very confident that that case will not increase the prices the consumers have to pay in the marketplace. There are some pending cases. Yes, we've got two going right now. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Bishop. Chair now recognizes himself for the second round.
▶ 1:17:56Congress recently passed a bipartisan take it down act, which I was proud to support, requiring online platforms to remove non-consensual im intimate images within 48 hours of a victim's request. The legislation tasks the FTC with ensuring the platforms comply with the law. What additional resources will be required by the commission to enforce the take it down act? We are really excited by the take it down act. This was one of President Trump's priorities. We think it's going to do a lot of good for vulnerable Americans.
▶ 1:18:24Um this is a new um front of enforcement authority for the FTC. Um it involves dealing with some oftentimes really horrible material in order to conduct the investigation. So I think we basically need three things. The first is I'm going to need a sort of a segregated technology system to house this material when we're conducting investigations. We're not going to want that intermingled with the sort of other breadandbut um data that the commission brings on to conduct investigations.
▶ 1:18:50And second, I'm going to need to hire some specialist investigators that deal with this stuff. Dealing with this stuff takes a real psychological toll on investigators. Um but there are investigators and lawyers that have training dealing with this stuff as prosecutors or as civil investigators in other um contexts and we would want to bring some of those folks on to maximize our enforcement efforts. So those are the sort of the two buckets, three specialist investigators and specialist lawyers to help enforce these things. Those are the three buckets.
▶ 1:19:19Segregated IT specialist investigators, specialist lawyers. Um, and I'm I I'd love to work with you on making sure that we will have the resources to carry out this super important priority. As a recovering prosecutor, I understand how important it is to also maintain that as evidence. Yes, exactly.
▶ 1:19:35cases and uh certainly one of the most shocking things you saw was in say the middle school, junior high school setting or high school where images gets shot around and kids send them to each other and next thing you know you have 800 counts on 800 separate people for for that type of juvenile pornography. So I think it's very important that they have the ability you have the ability to make sure that stops immediately.
▶ 1:20:00I I totally agree and because some of this material will potentially be seam, it is really important that it is segregated from everything else that we do and that we have specialists that know how to deal with it. Advances in artificial intelligence have increased the ability of scammers to unfortunately to deceive and defraud customers. Uh how long how have you seen the fraudulent schemes become more sophisticated and what are you doing to protect consumers from it? Yeah.
▶ 1:20:25So, I think AI can be used particularly for certain types of schemes to sort of supercharge the fraud. AI makes it easier to impersonate someone else. Uh, it's actually, frankly, quite terrifying. I don't know if anyone on this committee has ever gotten a call of like an impersonated loved one, but I have friends that have gotten calls from like impersonated family members. It's like a truly terrifying experience. Um so we have the impersonation rule that we are bringing enforcement actions on um to recover civil penalties for violations of this.
▶ 1:20:55We had a competition that we ran last year um to encourage people to develop voice cloning technology that will allow law enforcers to detect when AI is being used to um perform impersonations. Um, this is going to require sort of a whole of government approach because we have to both stop it before it gets to the consumer through their phone, but we also, you know, we have to work because a lot of this is criminal activity. You need prosecutors to assist. A lot of this comes from outside of the United States.
▶ 1:21:23These are people who are not going to be super responsive to sort of the civil law enforcement component of the FTC since they're already taking tremendous criminal risks outside the United States to do this. But this is one of our top priorities, particularly given that this is often aimed at some of our most vulnerable populations. Like there are not enough schemes targeted at these elderly. That's exactly right. Um, one of the things that I'm interested in as well is I know that it was used in the form of manipulating President Biden's voice to tell voters in the state not to come in the next day for the primary.
▶ 1:21:54Uh, in in my time in Homeland, uh, I attended a lot of cyber security with and they said that that was the start. in 28 you could produce the whole candidate and and somebody would never have to leave their house yet there would be images all around. So what I also have a concern with is competition and consolidation in this industry so you don't end up with just one sole source of this stuff. You any have any thoughts on how you're going toh prevent that from happening? Yeah, I I agree. I mean, the United States is the AI leader right now.
▶ 1:22:23And part of that is because we have a competitive, dynamic economy, and competition breeds innovation, and innovation is what gives us AI and is what gives us our advantage over China, for example, because we are competitive and competition breeds innovation. Um, it is very important that the FTC be particularly vigilant to make sure we competition problems don't seep into AI. At the same time, the other advantage that the United States has is that we don't reflexively regulate new technologies. We let them develop. We encourage innovation.
▶ 1:22:54We encourage experimentation. And we see how things go and then we address problems as they arise. I think that is equally important. Protecting competition in the space is important. Equally important is making sure that government regulators don't intervene too early, particularly with a technology that is transforming constantly, faster than even its engineers can predict. We don't want regulators coming in heavy-handed. By the time they even figure out what's going on, it will have changed.
▶ 1:23:20I think it's very important that that American entrepreneurial spirit be protected both from anti-competitive consolidation and from government overregulation. Thank you, Chair. Now recognize the ranking member uh for additional questions. Thank you very much. Uh Mr. Chairman, you were appointed a year ago, a little over.
▶ 1:23:42Yes, a little over a year Uh do you believe that the commissioners are at will commissioners? Um I believe that article two of the constitution gives the president the authority to remove commissioners at will. Yes. at the FTC in 2025. So you believe all the commissioners at will? I believe that the commissioners at the 2025 FTC are removable by the president. Yes. Okay.
▶ 1:24:08While we disagree on your conclusion, which is usual for lawyers, if in one of your descents, Mr. Biden had sent you a note saying uh we find your continued service on the SP FTC to be inconsistent with my administration priorities. Uh wouldn't that compromise the independence?
▶ 1:24:36Wouldn't that compromise your your decision making? Wouldn't you be thinking is is the president going to like my decision here if I'm in the uh and I can just be fired? Doesn't that compromise the independence and independent judgment of each and every one of the commissioners? When I took the oath of office as a minority commissioner in 2024, that oath obliged me to enforce the law without fear or favor.
▶ 1:25:04If the president of the United States concludes that my law enforcement decision is incorrect and orders me removed, that is what democratic accountability looks like. No one voted for me. No one elected me. And they did elect the president and they put the president in charge of the entire executive branch. And I think in a democracy it is critically important that everyone who wields substantial power over the lives of members of that democracy is accountable back to the people.
▶ 1:25:31And the only way we are accountable to the people is through their elected president. So I think that that chain of accountability is critical for making democracy work. I think that's very critical in undermining the independence and independent judgment of agencies created by the Congress to be independent.
▶ 1:25:54In fact, you were quoted as saying you thought the best thing to do was to reach consensus uh in and and that's why the Congress created bipartisan bodies as opposed to three Republicans or three Democrats. Um, your opinion of course mirrors Mr.
▶ 1:26:13Boat's opinion and and the president's opinion who believe that almost every employee in the federal government ought to be at will employees which would compromise the civil service system very substantially and create a political uh service not a civil service. Um, I want to ask you about the cases they're pending. Let me say something in your comment on China.
▶ 1:26:39Um, China is now out competing us in a number of ways. Um, and that is of great concern to all of us, I think. Um, where China has become number one in a number of different count economic categories. Um, I I share the president's view.
▶ 1:26:59I share I I share the view that we pursued by investing in competitive ability uh in the 117th Congress with a number of uh pieces of legislation that I mentioned in my opening statement. Um so I would hope that again on that 1100 that you talked about that that is a number consistent not with Mr.
▶ 1:27:26Uh Musk, I'm going to cut $2 trillion dollars, which was of course an absurd statement within the context of getting to an objective and keeping competitive with the rest of the world and keeping our country safe and keeping uh our people safe.
▶ 1:27:47Uh let me close by calling to your attention a statement that was made totally inconsistent with a statement you made which I with which I agree. Uh the statement is we want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected when they wake up in the morning. We want them not to want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as villains. We want to put them in trauma. Do you know who said that statement?
▶ 1:28:17I don't. Russell Boat, uh, the director of OM. Do you share that view? Um, my view is that the FTC has an important mission to do that it has to conduct that mission consistently with the president's priorities and with the budget that this Congress has given it. And that is what I wake up every day trying to do. I know it's what my staff wakes up every day trying to do. I know it's what my colleagues, Mr.
▶ 1:28:44Meador and or Commissioner Meadder and Commissioner Holio wake up every day trying to do and that's what I'm focused on. Could I correctly interpret that as a no? I'm focused on protecting the American consumer from monopoly and fraud. You can interpret it that way. So yes, I can interpret it as a no. You can interpret I am focused on protecting Americans from monopoly. You don't want to say that you disagree with vote. I understand. I I have not heard this statement before so have no position on it. All I know is what I am focused on. Okay.
▶ 1:29:12Well, forgetting about who it's for, you disagree with that statement. I have no position on the statement. I am focused on the FTC's mission of protecting Americans from monopolies and Chair now recognizes the gentle lady from Iowa, Mrs. Henson, for further questions. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Chairman Ferguson. I again I want to reiterate I appreciate the AY's focus on um accountability.
▶ 1:29:40Um, again coming back into the focus here, you mentioned in your opening statement, you know, the two-year hiring spree that was quote taking the FTC to levels that they couldn't sustain. Um, we have to write that ship. Many agencies saw increases over the last several years of more than 30%. That is unsustainable. So, I appreciate the work you're doing to rightsize the agency while still executing on the priorities. Um, at FTC, um, you talk about the contract spending reductions, $6 million. I'm sure that's just kind of scratching the surface, right?
▶ 1:30:09And in all of these hearings, I think there's one common theme. It's that uh we are peeling back the layers of this onion and finally getting a look at all of the waste, the duplic duplicative nature of some of these um agencies and their budgets. And um we as appropriators need to do our job. So I appreciate you uh coming before us today to answer some of these questions. And um under the previous FTC chair, obviously we saw this hiring spree happen.
▶ 1:30:32We saw um Chair Khan aggressively work to regulate um American businesses while claiming that she was protecting competition and consumers. So again, you talk about your refocus on away from rulemaking and back on protection. Um can you share with the committee some of the lessons you really learned um from the previous administration and the impacts of those regulatory burdens on small businesses, farmers, working families um like those you visited in in rural Virginia recently?
▶ 1:30:59Yeah, my my experience from over the course of my whole career is um even well-intentioned regulation tends to have unanticipated effects and those effects are normally visited on the least powerful participants in an industry which is normally small and medium-sized businesses. Big businesses can afford to lobby regulators and lawmakers to get the outcomes that they want in a way that small and medium-sized businesses cannot.
▶ 1:31:24Um, and there is always a risk with regulation that regulation will be used to insulate monopolies or to create monopolies. Um, but it's hard to sort of predict, you know, when well-intentioned regulation is going to do that. Um, I think that, you know, the the benefit of the way that the antitrust laws work is that they the principal motivation is don't harm consumers and workers in the marketplace. Free markets are good. They work.
▶ 1:31:52don't within the free market structure harm consumers to gain an advantage. And our job is to make sure that isn't happening. We're not central planners. We don't do industrial policy. Our job is to let the markets work by making sure that people within them aren't cheating by harming consumers to get a leg up. And I think that that sort of flexible general approach backed by rigorous investigation and law enforcement rather than trying to pick winners and losers through regulation is the way that we keep America competitive.
▶ 1:32:20It's the way we keep our dynamic and it's the way that we achieve growth that benefits everyone, especially workers. You mentioned earlier um in this hearing that you had a mechanism for people to kind of self-report. Um and one of the frequent things that I try to talk to our small businesses about is give me a list, right? Give me a list of the regulations. Everybody says I need regulatory relief. Give me a list of what's holding you back. Uh what is that mechanism? And and obviously it's designed to make sure that we can um deregulate as much as possible.
▶ 1:32:47And then can you again give me kind of a scope of what the next steps that you're taking um in terms of presenting that information to the administration? Yeah, there's a place on our website that you can go. You just fill out a form, identify what you think the regulation that is anti-competitive is, give a brief explanation of why, and then it shows up in our team's inbox and they're ready to go on it. Um I encourage Congress to do this, too. Again, you all interact with your constituents in a close, personal way. you hear from your individual small businesses about what's holding them back.
▶ 1:33:17Um, I've had similar conversations where I've had people come in and say, "You really need to go after anti-competitive regulations." And I'll say, "I agree. Can you please give me the list?" And they'll go, "Oh, well, no, no, the list is very specific, right?" Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Um, uh, so I encourage Congress, if you all hear from your constituents, let us know what they are, too. We've asked the agency heads, consistent with the president's executive order, to do the same thing.
▶ 1:33:40Once the um request for information, which is the one the public can use on our website and the agency responses are in, we will be going through them proposed rag by proposed rag and determining if they're anti-competitive and if they are either proposing shrinking them down to size so that they are protecting whatever they're supposed to protect without damaging competition or recommending that they be deleted entirely because there's no way to save them while still promoting competition. Is there a certain time frame that you're looking at and I'm almost out of time.
▶ 1:34:06a certain time frame you're looking at getting some of this feedback in so that you can number one work through the process because I know it'll take some time to figure out what's actually anticompetitive versus what people just don't want to comply with, right? I mean, I think there's probably a balance to be there's definitely a balance to be had there, but um I think um is there any kind of timeline that you're looking at? The RFI closes in a couple months um and agency responses are due to us on a rolling basis.
▶ 1:34:29So once we have those in, we're building the team with the Department of Justice who has a lot of resources that will work alongside us on this just like the president ordered. Um I, you know, I don't know exactly when the outcome or when our product will be made available because I at this point I don't know how many regulations we're going to be asked to review, but we'll have an army of economists and lawyers ready to go to dig into these things to find the ones that are anti-competitive and go back to OM and the president and say, "Here's the list we recommend get rid of." I'm sure Iowa business owners have some glaring examples they'll be
▶ 1:34:59happy to submit. So, thank him. Thank you so much, Chairman Ferguson. I yield back. Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Maryland for any further questions he may have for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I I did want to follow up on um the ranking members questions about the at will issue.
▶ 1:35:17So I mentioned in my initial round your statement, the March 18th statement, and that it didn't contain the language with respect to um inefficiency, neglective duty or malfeasants in office, uh which comes from 15 USC section 41 of I guess that's the Federal Trade Commission Act. But I think if I'm hearing what your answer was, the reason you didn't include is because you think it's the language is superseded.
▶ 1:35:47In other words, that article two makes it unnecessary so that the president can fire without regard to that statute. That that that's right, Congressman Ivy. After the Supreme Court's decision in CIA law in 2020 that said that Humphrey's executive does not apply to agencies that wield substantial executive authority, whatever was true of the FTC in 1935 is just not true of the 2025 FTC. We're one of the most powerful agencies in the federal government.
▶ 1:36:15We have rulemaking authority, law enforcement authority, investigative power. After seal law in 2020, article 2 requires that the president be authorized to remove them at will. Okay? And that's that's going to be I guess a central issue issue in the litigation that that you're a defendant in. That's right, Congressman. All right. And would it be also your view beyond this particular with respect to the FTC that that's true for all independent commissions at the federal level?
▶ 1:36:40The only uh the only one I have a position on because it's the only one that I've studied myself as a defendant in the litigation and as the agency head is the FTC. Different agencies are different. They had different historical patterns and there's nothing Congress could do about it, I guess, based on the statement you're making because any statute we passed along the lines of uh 15 USC 41 would only be a statute.
▶ 1:37:05And you're saying there's there's a uh ability for the president to fire any one of these commissioners at will at any time, regardless of what Congress says. So, not quite. And I I don't mean to quibble, but what the Supreme Court said in 2020 in CILA law is Congress cannot insulate from removal agency heads at agencies that quote wield substantial executive. I got you. I got you.
▶ 1:37:30But given your your conclusion that this agency wields that kind of authority, short of us stripping the FTC of of certain levels of authority, there's nothing Congress could do to protect commissioners from at will or even arbitrary termination at the FTC. Yes. And I do want to be clear.
▶ 1:37:48My former colleagues in their brief have said that if they agree with the the presidents and my position on sea law, they have asked the court to hold unconstitutional statutes that this body passed after 1935. Shocking thing to say. Fair enough.
▶ 1:38:06Um want to go quickly to the chairman's questions with respect to the uh take it down act and well your comments about that and AI fraud uh and impersonation issues which are of deep concern to me. But I wanted to see if I could get you to talk about that in the context of another statement you made which was that you want to shift from rulemaking to enforcement. And I I I want to make sure I understand what you mean by that because sort of two points.
▶ 1:38:36One is with new statutes or areas in my view rule making could be very important in trying to get ahead of the curve on these things especially since technology evolves so quickly. You know to the extent we're trying to legislate to address every sort of techn technological change that's going to be impossible.
▶ 1:38:55Uh and then the other part with respect to the rulemaking piece, I have heard from um business owners uh that they actually are they get concerned about the enforcement component because in order for them to find out what's permissible and what's not, they have to get wrapped on the nose uh through a litigation process.
▶ 1:39:17Whereas, if there's a rule making process that gives them guidance, even if they don't necessarily like the outcome of what the rule making process is, at least they don't have to litigate it. And you know, as we know, the litigation piece can take years potentially in some of these circumstances. So, real quick, I only have 36 seconds left. if you could walk through some of that for me.
▶ 1:39:39But the rule making piece in particular, are you moving away entirely from rulem or just trying to hedge it back to some extent? When Congress directly instructs the commission to adopt a rule like it did, for example, in the child's online privacy protection act, the commission will adopt rules where we're expressly ordered to. A lot of the rulemaking of the last four years were rules on section five, just general our general, you know, anti-fraud, anti- unfairness statute.
▶ 1:40:09My position is that we protect consumers most when we take bad actors to court and win judgments more than spending several years writing a rule, preparing it for release, and then defending that rule in court. For example, the non-compete rule has literally never gone into effect because it was enjoined after its adoption. We could have been using those resources to bring non-compete cases rather than the rule. My view is rather than to I'm over time, but real quick.
▶ 1:40:39So with respect to the take it down act and the AI fraud impersonation legislation, you're on board for aggressive rule making with respect to those two so that they can be enforced uh and protect the public. So the take it down act would not require a rule. The second that it becomes effective, we can start enforcing the requirement to take to abide by takedown notices. That wouldn't require a rule and we will assuming that we have the resources available.
▶ 1:41:06That will be one of my top priorities and that's what I mean by enforcement. When Congress passes a law that says to people in marketplace, don't do X. If someone does X, I would rather spend resources taking those people to court than writing a rule about it. Thank you. Thank you. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Missouri, Mr. Halford, for any questions you may have. Uh thank you, Chairman Joyce, and thank you uh to my friend, Ranking Member Hoyer, for holding this important hearing today. Good to see you again. You were in our office, I think, last week, Chairman Ferguson.
▶ 1:41:34Uh, I'm excited that you're leading the FTC. Uh, in your opening remarks, you mentioned how the Trump Vance FTC has gone back to the agency's roots, namely enforcement of the law, which is a good thing. While I commend you for your realization that the power to write laws is and should remain right here in Congress, there's still actions that the previous chairman or chairwoman took to go beyond the agency's authority. I have serious concerns about the so-called independent agencies usurping lawmaking authority from Congress.
▶ 1:42:03Chair Ferguson, can you comment on the cars rule, please? Um, the cars rule was adopted. It was vacated. Um, and the period to um seek has long since run. So, it is not effective and I at least as of the day that we are sitting here, I currently have no plans to take up the rulemaking again. Very good. Uh, I was a proud supporter of the Take It Down Act, which passed Congress last month. Uh, in a followup to uh my friend Mr.
▶ 1:42:32Ivy's uh question with you regarding that this act would require the FTC to enforce notice and removal requirements for non-consentual intimate visual depictions. So you talked about resources going forward. You are going to enforce this. You don't need a rule to do this. What resources do you have to make sure that this happens? So what we need are we need segregated IT systems. A lot of this material is truly disgusting stuff. Some of it will be CSAM.
▶ 1:42:59We don't want that intermingled with the rest of our data infrastructure. And then we'll need specialist investigators and and lawyers who can deal with this like often truly horrifying material. How much extra is that going to be an investment from the taxpayers. Um so given the current status of the budget and the skinny budget, I'm not in a position to discuss specific numbers, although I'm happy to have my staff discuss that with you directly offline.
▶ 1:43:23Um I when you get those numbers, we would like this is very important I think for the future of our country. And if it's going to be done the right way, not through rulemaking, but through enforcement from you and the Federal Trade Commission, we've got to make sure you have the resources you need to do the job uh to take care of this issue. I look forward to working with you on getting those. President Trump uh recently issued an executive order to reduce anti-competitive regulatory barriers.
▶ 1:43:51How is the FDC implementing the executive order? and has the commission already identified specific regulations that are inhibiting market competition? So, consistent with the president's executive order um which I think is one of the most important things that the president has done um in a series of amazing executive orders, we issued a request for information to the public asking especially small business owners, if you are aware of regulations that are making it harder for you to compete, tell us what they are.
▶ 1:44:19We wrote um letters to the a all of the agency heads in the federal government last week and said um ident send us a list of regulations that you think are anti-competitive that you enforce and if you think that they should not be deleted an explanation about why they should not be deleted because presumptively we think anti-competitive regulations should be deleted. That that RFI that request for public assistance is still open. It closes in the next couple months. the agency heads are supposed to produce stuff to us and to the Department of Justice on a rolling basis.
▶ 1:44:49Um, you know, we are waiting for stuff to come in before we start identifying specific ones, but we will have an army of lawyers and economists ready to go on this with the Department of Justice. And once we've identified them, we're sending them to the president and OM with recommendations for deletion. You said they're coming in on a rolling basis. You've already received some. Uh, not yet. They're supposed to respond on a rolling basis. Okay, gotcha. Uh, hey, listen. I just appreciate you and and your passion for our country and for the Federal Trade Commission and really setting us on a new course.
▶ 1:45:17Uh this golden age of America is going to include um regulation and not rulemaking and that's why we're here and we're here to to fund you to make sure you can do that job. And Mr. Chair, I yield back. Thank you. Thank you, Congressman. Thank you very much, sir. Uh the chair now recognizes a gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Bishop, for any questions he may Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
▶ 1:45:42Um, Chairman Fergus, it's been reported in the news that FTC is working with Doge uh to make cuts to your agency. Uh, can you tell us what the role of Doge is at FTC and what data have they accessed and what data have they copied?
▶ 1:46:00Uh and can you assure the public that Doge and its affiliates are not accessing confidential business data or sharing the data with potential competitors of the businesses are not limited to but including the Musk network of businesses. Uh Congress first established the FTC as an independent agency.
▶ 1:46:21tell us how this is still the case when the White House and private individuals with temporary government positions have such unprecedented access and control over the agency's operations. I I can definitely tell you that no FTC employee, including those that are detailed over from United States Doge Services, um are given access to anything they don't have a need for.
▶ 1:46:44The two employees that originated from USDS that have been onboarded onboarded as full-time employees of the commission received the same ethics vetting, background check, and data security training that every other employee, including me, has received. Their access is governed by the exact same rules that governs the access of every other employee, including me, which is that no one gets access to any particular part of our IT infrastructure without having a need to demonstrated need to access it. We have rigidly enforced those rules for every employee at the FTC.
▶ 1:47:14Okay. So, so you you actually your agency enforces those rules. Absolutely. We there is a statute forbidding the disclosure of const of confidential commission information. It makes it a misdemeanor to do so. We take that extremely seriously both because Congress has said it's a misdemeanor to do so, but also because our ability to work with companies in investigations depends on them knowing we will not leak out information. We had a real leak problem in the previous administration that caused tremendous embarrassment to the commission.
▶ 1:47:43The commission under President Trump has taken this issue incredibly seriously for all employees including the ones from USDS. Your FTC people are not worried at all about uh intimidation from the administration or from Doge uh if they failed to comply or if they question uh a need that is suggested that they may not uh believe this necessarily. So, no, we have had USDS employees that have been on boarded the FTC have been incredibly helpful.
▶ 1:48:11They helped us find contracts that allowed us that we could descope or eliminate while still fulfilling our mission to the American people. We've had a great working relationship with the USDS folks and I unequivocally support the president's general. Any instances where they've asked for information and been denied it? Not to my knowledge. No, I didn't think so. All right, with gentlemen yield back that with that our time has concluded.
▶ 1:48:40I know this has been a lot of fun for you, sir. Uh, but I'd like to thank you for being here today, Chairman Ferguson. There may be some members who are not here who would like to submit questions for the records. Please submit any question for the record to the subcommittee staff within seven days. And with that, this subcommittee stands adjourned.