New GOP FTC Commissioner hiring senior Jordan staffer

Melissa Holyoak, sworn in Monday as a Republican on the Federal Trade Commission, is planning to hire a Capitol Hill staffer who has been closely involved with Rep. Jim Jordan's (R-Ohio) ongoing partisan criticism and oversight investigations of agency chair Lina Khan and FTC staff, according to two people with direct knowledge of the pending hire.

Holyoak is planning to hire Doug Geho, the chief antitrust counsel for the House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Jordan, as an attorney adviser on consumer protection issues, the people said. Holyoak joined Monday as the first GOP commissioner at the five-member, bipartisan body in a year. Geho is expected to start in the new role soon, the people said.

The hire is striking because of Geho’s key role in Jordan’s aggressive oversight campaign against Khan as well as FTC career staff. He played a central role in authoring a House Judiciary staff report, released in late February, which “focuses on mismanagement, waste and abuse of government resources by senior leadership at the FTC — specifically Chair Khan, her direct staff, and the Bureau of Competition Front Office.”

Khan and Jordan have tussled for more than a year, with the dispute spilling out unusually into public view last July. At the time Khan accused Jordan and his Judiciary Committee staff of ethical breaches in a “campaign to intimidate and harass” the agency’s career staff after he threatened to subpoena a number of its rank-and-file attorneys. Geho was among the staffers referenced by Khan, according to the people and a document seen by POLITICO.

An FTC spokesperson declined to comment. Russell Dye, a spokesperson for the Judiciary Committee declined to comment on the hiring, but called Geho "one of the best lawyers on Capitol Hill." A representative in Holyoak’s office also did not respond to a request for comment; nor did Geho.

While some Republicans in Congress, like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), have been effusive in their praise of Khan, particularly for the FTC’s work tackling the dominance of large tech companies, many others have been highly critical. Khan and the FTC are under three separate House oversight probes, which also include the House Oversight and Energy and Commerce committees.

Holyoak's other attorney advisers include Chris Mufarrige, a former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau staffer handling competition issues, and Elisa Jillson, a career staffer focused on privacy enforcement.