House Antitrust Panel Taking Aim At Big Government Instead Of Big Tech
The new Republican leadership of the House Antitrust Committee is focused on dismantling large governments rather than targeting big tech like the committee's Democratic predecessors.
The House Judiciary Committee overtook the Antitrust Committee, Republicans elected new leadership and shifted their focus to regulatory and regulatory powers of federal agencies and antitrust issues.
The operations of major US tech companies was a key area of study for the Democrat-led committee before the Republicans took the helm this year.
The unelected bureaucrats who enact regulations that serve as a substitute for laws passed by Congress are one of the MPs' primary targets. Thomas Massey, new chair of the State Subcommittee on Administrative, Regulatory and Antitrust Reform.
Mr Massey said at the committee's first hearing on Friday that federal agencies would wrest legislative power away from Congress. He registered offenders with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Federal Trade Commission and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
"In recent years, the administering nation has passed 20 times more legislation than the elected officials of the United States have passed legislation through the process prescribed by the Constitution," Massey said.
Democratic lawmakers have criticized the subcommittee's new approach, saying it should focus on legislation related to environmental cleanup efforts following last month's Norfolk Southern freight train derailment in Ohio.
Rep. David Ciciline, D-Rhode Island, said Friday that the reorganized committee's priorities represented support in Congress that would lead to the lifting of restrictions while putting Americans at risk.
Mr. Ciciline chairs the Democrat-controlled Antitrust Committee and announced plans to leave Congress this year.
"Last month's eastern Palestine derailment and the Norfolk Southern derailment in Springfield, Ohio," Ciciline said at the hearing. "More restrictions will lead to more tragedies in the future."
New York Democrat Jerrold Nadler described the shift in focus by Republican lawmakers as a return to old ideas from previous congressional cycles. The top-ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee says GOP lawmakers are pushing for anti-health and safety legislation aimed at protecting corporate profits more than people.
Mr Massey said he didn't want rules. Reasonable minds cannot agree on different policy solutions, he said, but they must agree that Congress should write laws rather than submit to a federal agency that makes the rules.
