In recent weeks, the Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched task forces that target potential barriers to competition created by government regulators and private-sector employers. On March 27, 2025, the DOJ announced an “Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force” to “advocate for the elimination of anticompetitive state and federal laws and regulations that undermine free market competition” across various industries. On Feb. 26, 2025, the FTC issued a press release and memorandum from Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson directing the formation of a “Joint Labor Task Force” to “prioritize rooting out and prosecuting deceptive, unfair, and anticompetitive labor-market practices.”
The agencies’ announcements describe industries and practices that will be the task forces’ primary areas of focus:
- The FTC’s announcement reflects its continuing concern regarding potentially anticompetitive practices of private employers that existed under the Biden administration and the first Trump administration. Consistent with prior statements by Ferguson, the FTC’s memorandum highlighted that non-solicitation and noncompete clauses fall within FTC Act jurisdiction as potentially unfair methods of competition and that the FTC will investigate and pursue violations.
- The DOJ’s task force, on the other hand, represents a sharp pivot in furtherance of President Donald Trump’s mandate that federal agencies unwind laws and regulations across the federal government, and it will solicit public comment through May 26, 2025, seeking examples of anticompetitive regulations and the harm they cause. The DOJ specifically called out housing, transportation, food and agriculture, healthcare and energy as industries in which protection and enhancement of competition may have “the greatest impact on American households.”
FTC’s Joint Labor Task Force
Ferguson’s memorandum instructs the directors of the FTC’s Bureaus of Competition, Consumer Protection, and Economics and the Office of Policy Planning to form a Joint Labor Task Force to carry out initiatives “to harmonize the FTC’s law-enforcement efforts on behalf of workers” in consumer protection and competition matters. The memorandum charges the task force with:
- prioritizing investigations and prosecutions of deceptive, unfair, or anticompetitive labor market conduct and coordinating all such actions across the FTC;
- creating information-sharing protocols across the FTC to exchange best practices for uncovering and investigating such conduct;
- promoting research regarding harmful labor market practices;
- identifying opportunities to advocate for legislative or regulatory changes to remove barriers to labor market participation, mobility, and competition; and
- informing workers of the state of the law and encouraging them to report deceptive, unfair or anticompetitive labor market conduct to the FTC.
The Chairman’s directive highlights several examples of deceptive, unfair and anticompetitive labor practices that fall under the FTC’s enforcement jurisdiction and that the Joint Labor Task Force is directed to target, including: no-poach, non-solicitation or no-hire agreements; noncompete agreements; wage-fixing agreements; labor-contract termination penalties; labor market monopsonies; deceptive job advertising (such as misleading earnings claims); deceptive business opportunities (such as false or misleading representations about the value and potential earnings of the business); harming gig economy workers; misleading franchise offerings; unnecessary occupational licensing requirements; job scams; and collusion or unlawful coordination on DEI employment metrics.
Many of these enforcement priorities mirror those outlined in the Jan. 16, 2025, Antitrust Guidelines for Business Activities Affecting Workers jointly issued by the DOJ and FTC at the end of the Biden administration, summarized in a previous alert. Even though some of the other employment and hiring practices that the FTC trained its crosshairs on may have changed, a key takeaway from Chairman Ferguson’s memorandum is that labor market competition will remain under close scrutiny by enforcers. Those who hoped the FTC would “walk away” from past condemnation of employer-employee noncompete clauses will be disappointed to see that such agreements remain an enforcement focus, even if the chairman is unlikely to push for a replacement to the currently set-aside Biden-era noncompete prohibition rule.
DOJ’s Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force
The DOJ’s press release outlines three steps that its Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force will take to identify unnecessary laws and regulations that may stifle competition and advocate for their elimination. First, the DOJ will invite the public to provide comments by May 26, 2025, about laws and regulations that make it more difficult for businesses to compete effectively. The press release specifies that the DOJ seeks input from consumers, businesses and other participants in the housing, transportation, food and agriculture, healthcare, and energy markets. With respect to healthcare, the DOJ press release noted that healthcare laws and regulations often “encourage overbilling and consolidation.”
Second, the Antitrust Division will partner with other federal and state agencies to identify and eliminate laws and regulations that unnecessarily harm competition. Third, the Antitrust Division will pursue other efforts to advocate for the removal of anticompetitive laws and regulations, including by filing amicus briefs and statements of interests in private litigation and providing comments on proposed state legislation.
The press release provides that the DOJ’s Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force aims to promote two executive orders issued by Trump directing his administration to pursue deregulation. The DOJ invokes Executive Order 14192 (Jan. 31, 2025), which declares that “the policy of the executive branch” is that federal agencies should “alleviate unnecessary regulatory burdens placed on the American people,” and Executive Order 14219 (Feb. 19, 2025), which directs federal agencies to “initiate a process to review all regulations” and identify those that “impose undue burdens on small businesses and impede private enterprise and entrepreneurship.” The Antitrust Division will support federal agencies’ deregulatory initiatives spurred by these executive orders “by sharing its market expertise on regulations that pose the greatest barriers to economic growth.”
Antitrust enforcers engaged in similar efforts during President Trump’s first term. In 2017, the FTC formed an “Economic Liberty Task Force” to work with states to review and reform occupational licensing requirements. And in 2018, the DOJ’s Antitrust Division published a report on how regulations can harm competition and submitted comments to federal agencies advocating for the elimination of unnecessary regulations. According to the DOJ’s press release, its Anticompetitive Regulations Task force “will continue these efforts” and support the initiatives under Trump’s second term to “unleash competition by eliminating unnecessary, burdensome, and wasteful government regulations.”
Businesses need to keep a close eye on the efforts of the new task forces. The initiatives undertaken by the DOJ’s Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force may lead to significant changes in the regulatory landscape across several agencies and industries and could influence regulatory and organizational shakeups by other department heads such as Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s Department of Health and Human Services. And the FTC’s Joint Labor Task Force is likely to continue scrutinizing and challenging potentially anticompetitive employment practices. Businesses should consider reviewing their labor-related practices in order to minimize the risk of antitrust enforcement actions and prepare for changes flowing from the elimination or reduction of regulatory oversight and restrictions. For questions on any of these issues, contact the authors or other attorneys in McGuireWoods’ antitrust, healthcare, energy, state attorney general, or other regulatory-focused practice groups.