Longtime Amazon critic Lina Khan seeks to rein in retailer
By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan's years-long push to challenge the power of Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) reached a turning point on Tuesday when her agency filed a sweeping antitrust lawsuit against the online retailer.
In 2017, Khan wrote an influential academic article arguing the company's structure and practices posed anticompetitive concerns and had escaped antitrust scrutiny.
«With its missionary zeal for consumers, Amazon has marched toward monopoly by singing the tune of contemporary antitrust,» Khan, then 29, wrote in the Yale Law Journal. Amazon «has evaded government scrutiny in part through fervently devoting its business strategy and rhetoric to reducing prices for consumers.»
Six years later, Khan, who became the FTC's chair in 2021, is leading the agency's antitrust charge against the online retailer. The FTC on Tuesday asked a judge «to put an end to Amazon's illegal course of conduct, pry loose Amazon's monopolistic control, deny Amazon the fruits of its unlawful practices, and restore the lost promise of competition.»
Khan said on Tuesday that Amazon «has used a set of punitive and coercive tactics to unlawfully maintain its monopolies.» She argued that the company is «exploiting its monopoly power to enrich itself while raising prices and degrading service for the tens of millions of American families who shop on its platform.»
Amazon has fought back over the years.
In 2021, the retailing giant filed a petition asking for Khan to be recused on Amazon-related matters, saying she had «repeatedly called for breaking up Amazon throughout her career.» On Tuesday it rejected the antitrust lawsuit, saying Amazon has helped to spur competition and innovation
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