There has been a flurry of opposition directed at the most
sweeping reform bills, including from the powerful U.S. Chamber
of Commerce, Amazon.com Inc, Apple Inc, Facebook Inc and
Alphabet Inc's Google.
Facebook, for example, argued that the bills underestimate
competition from overseas and "are a poison pill for America’s
tech industry at a time our economy can least afford it."
Each of the bills has multiple Democratic and Republican
co-sponsors, and each has sparked opposition, or at least
concern, from members of both political parties.
Eight U.S. House of Representatives Democrats wrote to the House
and Judiciary Committee leadership last week, urging them to
delay the vote.
Republicans Jim Jordan and Mark Meadows said in an opinion piece
that "these bills would wreak bureaucratic havoc on conservative
values, speech and free enterprise."
A White House official said U.S. President Joe Biden believes
steps are needed to protect privacy, generate more innovation
and deal with other problems created by big technology
platforms.
The companies have spent nearly the past two years facing
federal, state and congressional probes into how they use their
clout to fend off competition, extend their dominance into
adjacent markets or abuse their dominance.
Two of the bills address the issue of giant companies, such as
Amazon and Google, creating a platform for other businesses and
then competing against those same businesses. One would require
the competing business to be sold while the other would require
platforms to refrain from favoring their own businesses.
A third bill would require a platform to refrain from any merger
unless it could show the acquired company does not compete with
it. A fourth would require platforms to allow users to transfer
their data elsewhere.
The last two would increase the budgets of antitrust enforcers
and ensure that antitrust cases brought by state attorneys
general remain in the court they select.
(Reporting by Diane Bartz in Washington; Editing by Matthew
Lewis)
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