Lawmakers Seek to Restore Antitrust Funding to Spending Bill

Leah Nylen
·3 min read
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

(Bloomberg) -- A bipartisan group of lawmakers are urging colleagues to reinstate funding to the Justice Department’s antitrust enforcers in the spending bill set to be considered by Congress this week.

Most Read from Bloomberg

In a letter on Tuesday to the top House and Senate negotiators on the budget package, the lawmakers expressed “strong opposition” to a provision that they said would divert some corporate filing fees for mergers collected by the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission.

The letter was signed by Senators Amy Klobuchar, a Minnesota Democrat, and Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, as well as three House members, including the Judiciary Committee’s top Democrat, Jerrold Nadler of New York.

In December 2022, Congress approved legislation to increase the fees in an effort to better support antitrust enforcement efforts. The antitrust division collected $55 million in fees in the first three months of the fiscal year, according to the White House Office of Management and Budget.

“Unfortunately, the 2024 appropriations bill does not provide the Antitrust Division with full access to the pre-merger filing fees. We urge you to support the enforcement work of our antitrust agencies,” the lawmakers wrote.

In a joint statement Wednesday, Democratic Senators Patty Murray of Washington state and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire said House Republicans had sought to gut funding to the antitrust division.

We “managed to secure increased funding for the Division in tough bipartisan negotiations,” said the senators, both of whom sit on the Senate Appropriations Committee. “This record funding level will help further the Division’s work to level the playing field, and we remain absolutely committed to protecting and strengthening the Division’s funding now and in the years to come.”

In a speech on the Senate floor on Tuesday evening, Klobuchar – the lead Democratic sponsor on the merger fees bill – singled out “a little group in a committee behind closed doors” for diverting the money.

“This is not an appropriations decision. It’s a policy against antitrust enforcement that undermines a bipartisan law,” Klobuchar said.

Mergers valued at more than $119.5 million must notify the federal antitrust authorities and wait at least 30 days before closing. The 2022 changes increased the size of the fees for the biggest mergers while lowering them for smaller deals.

Earlier: Antitrust Funding Deal Is Blow to Apple, Ticketmaster Probes

The funding deal provides $233 million to the antitrust division for enforcement from fees collected from merging companies. While that figure is $8 million more than Congress provided in fiscal 2023, the amount is $45 million less than the $278 million that the Congressional Budget Office estimated the agency would collect in fees this year.

In previous budgets, any excess fees collected in one year would carry over into the next. The proposed 2024 budget, however, would prevent antitrust enforcers from accessing those fees in future years without additional legislation.

An explanatory statement accompanying the bill said that “fee collections are inherently unpredictable and vary based on economic conditions and other factors.”

Congressional budget negotiators were squeezed by a budget cap agreement, which required overall domestic funding outside of health care for veterans to be cut. That led to a trimming of some agencies, including the FBI operating budget.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said President Joe Biden strongly supports funding for antitrust enforcement, which would increase by 4% under the current proposal.

“These full-year bills represent a compromise,” she said Tuesday at the daily briefing with reporters. “So, no one got everything they wanted, obviously. That’s what a compromise is. But they fund the government, prevent a damaging shutdown, and protect our progress.”

--With assistance from Michelle Jamrisko.

(Updates with comments from appropriations chairs in sixth paragraph.)

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

©2024 Bloomberg L.P.