This month, the US Department of Justice Antitrust Division revised its “Frequently Asked Questions About the Antitrust Division’s Leniency Program and Model Leniency Letters” (FAQs), with releases both before and after the new administration took office. The revisions serve as a signal that the continuity we have seen in previous years from the Antitrust Division is likely to continue. The changes include long-needed clarifications and updates since the release of the FAQs in 2008.
On October 14, 2016, former vice president and director of information technology of Coach USA, Inc. (Coach), Ralph Groen, entered a guilty plea for concealing and attempting to destroy documents and giving false and misleading statements under oath in a deposition during the US Department of Justice Antitrust Division’s (DOJ) investigation of a joint-venture involving Coach.
The DOJ’s complaint alleged that despite two preservation notices issued by Coach to its management team, which included Groen, Groen directed subordinates to destroy month-end backup tapes of emails and electronic records. Due to the destruction, the records were not produced to the United States during discovery. The government argued that these materials were relevant and responsive to the DOJ’s discovery requests. Additionally, Groen then falsely informed the company’s outside counsel that these materials did not exist. Groen also concealed versions of backup procedure documents that would have been relevant and responsive to the DOJ’s requests, and only provided one version. Finally, during a deposition where Groen testified as a 30(b)(6) deponent in September 2013, he lied under oath, providing false and misleading statements to the government about Coach’s document retention practices and policies. (more…)
On Monday, October 3, 2016, Hillary Clinton issued a statement on her website titled “Hillary Clinton’s Vision for an Economy Where our Businesses, our Workers, and Our Consumers Grow and Prosper Together.”
Prior to this statement, there had been some speculation over what a Clinton presidency might bring in terms of antitrust enforcement.
Unlike President Barack Obama, former Secretary Clinton had not issued a clear policy statement on her antitrust position before Monday. She had, however, penned one short op-ed piece for Quartz, and had made some general statements on the campaign trail regarding the problems of industry consolidation. It was unclear from these prior statements whether a Clinton administration would mean any change in the current state of affairs at Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The current administration has challenged a higher percentage of mergers than any administration since before Reagan’s, but it has not significantly altered the law regarding what mergers are considered actionable.
In her Quartz op-ed, Secretary Clinton stated that “we need to fix [the system],” and decried the concentrated markets in the pharmaceutical, airline and telecommunications industries. But Secretary Clinton gave only two concrete examples of how she would “take on the fight” against “large corporations.” (more…)
On Monday, April 11, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) confirmed in a press release that Bill Baer will serve in the DOJ’s third-highest ranking position effective April 17, 2016. Baer will be stepping in for Acting Associate Attorney General Stuart Delery.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch praised Baer’s record at the Antitrust Division, noting that he has worked to obtain $400 million in relief for consumers in a case against Apple for the price-fixing of e-books, achieved a record level of fines from large banks in the LIBOR scandal, and defended consumers in industries from beer and wine to airlines and phone companies.
Baer was nominated by President Obama and was confirmed to lead the Antitrust Division in December 2012. It has been widely reported that Renata Hesse, Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Criminal and Civil Operations, will take the reins upon Baer’s departure. Hesse previously served as Acting Assistant Attorney General for a short time preceding Baer’s confirmation.
Practitioners do not expect Baer’s move to affect the Division’s track record of aggressive enforcement in recent years. On Friday, at the American Bar Association Antitrust Spring Meeting, Baer stated that the federal government has shown it is serious about stopping what it sees as competition-reducing mergers. Baer emphasized that the government is looking at the overall market as well as the individual pieces, and that lawyers should not “get lost in the weeds as you’re advising your clients about the antitrust merits.”
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