The world's richest man on Thursday joined the billionaire chorus calling for the firing of Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan, a consumer and antitrust champion whose aggressive actions against corporate consolidation have made her a target of prominent executives and Republicans in Congress.
"She will be fired soon," Elon Musk, a billionaire supporter of Republican nominee Donald Trump, wrote on his social media platform in response to a GOP-led House Oversight Committee report accusing Khan of abusing her authority to "launch an intimidation campaign to chill mergers of all kinds."
Democrats on the committee said the GOP report is "riddled with misinterpretations, mistruths, and cherry-picked experts" attempting to discredit Khan's "work taking down greedy monopolies, lowering drug and food prices for Americans, and ensuring scammers don't prey on our most vulnerable neighbors—a pro-consumer agenda celebrated even by Republicans."
One of the Republicans who has praised Khan is Trump's running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), who said in August that the FTC chair has "been very smart about trying to go after some of these big tech companies that monopolize what we're allowed to say in our own country."
Under Khan's leadership, the FTC has filed suit against Meta, Amazon, and Microsoft and has taken concrete action to fix problems that Trump has claimed to want to solve.
American Economic Liberties Project (AELP), an anti-monopoly advocacy group that has celebrated Khan's work, said Thursday that Musk—who has spent at least $118 million supporting Trump's presidential campaign—"joins a long list of oligarchs who want [the FTC chair] fired for using her office to serve the public, not the rich and well-connected."
In a report released earlier this week, AELP noted that thanks in significant part to Khan's FTC, the Biden-Harris administration has "brought to trial four times as many billion-dollar merger challenges as Trump-Pence or Obama-Biden enforcers did."
"The durability of this progress depends on executive branch commitment—especially in the face of deep-pocketed lawbreakers fixated on kneecapping antitrust law enforcement through constitutional challenges and personnel changes," said Laurel Kilgour, AELP's research manager.
Khan's term officially expired at the end of September, but she is set to stay in her position indefinitely until the winner of next week's presidential election decides whether to keep or replace her.
Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, has been quiet about whether she would retain Khan as some of her billionaire donors—including LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and investor Mark Cuban—have called for the FTC chair's removal.
"How do we know that Lina Khan has done an excellent job as FTC chair? Because billionaires and business leaders want her gone," former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote Thursday in response to Musk, whom Trump has pledged to put in charge of a "government efficiency" commission tasked with identifying regulations and spending to slash.
"She's been an avid anti-trust enforcer and defender of working people," Reich added of Khan. "She's also been an oligarch's worst nightmare."
NBC Newsreported Thursday that progressives are gearing up for a fight to keep Khan in place as FTC chair if Harris defeats Trump on November 5.
"If Vice President Harris wins, her decision whether to replace Lina Khan and other enforcement officials will be the first big test of whether she wants to preserve the broad coalition built by the Biden-Harris administration, or whether she'll choose ongoing conflict with progressives instead," Dan Geldon, a consultant and former chief of staff to Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), told NBC.
