Facebook Seeks US FTC Chair Lina Khan's Recusal in Antitrust Case
Facebook on Wednesday asked for the recusal of Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan from the FTC’s antitrust case against the company, a step that could imperil the agency’s lawsuit against it.
A prominent critic of Big Tech who was sworn in as FTC chair in June, Khan previously worked for the House Judiciary antitrust subcommittee, which issued a report in October that spelled out what it said was anti-competitive conduct by Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Alphabet’s Google.
“Chair Khan has consistently made well-documented statements about Facebook and antitrust matters that would lead any reasonable observer to conclude that she has prejudged the Facebook antitrust case brought by the FTC,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.
“To protect the fairness and impartiality of these proceedings, we have requested that Chair Khan recuse herself from involvement with the FTC’s antitrust case against Facebook.”
The FTC declined comment on the recusal petition. Two weeks ago Amazon, which is under investigation by the FTC, also asked for Khan to be recused.
The FTC sued Facebook in December, alleging the social media giant broke antitrust law in buying photo-sharing app Instagram and messaging service WhatsApp. A US judge in June dismissed the complaint and gave the agency a roadmap for how to rewrite it with a deadline of July 29 to refile it.
