Fun to stay at the ymca to un chiefociated press bureau discusses the political career of President Trump as he seeks reelection for a second term in the white house. Utilizing video from the video library, dating back more than two decades, they talk about Donald Trumps transition to reality to vote Reality Television star. Their experiences covering the campaign and the administration. Watch sunday night on cspan. Or listen on the free cspan radio up radio app. You are watching cspan, your unfiltered you have government. Created by Americans Television americas television companies. This week on the communicators, democratic member of the central trade commission, rebecca slaughter. It is a pleasure to be here today. What this pandemic has involved for me is time with a brandnew baby and juggling those responsibilities, which is not a common occurrence for commissioners, pandemic or no pandemic. In terms of the work of the agency, it has been a really port in and fascinating really important and fascinating time. We switched to all telework pretty quickly, and seamlessly in march, which i was impressed by. Even though technological work got up quickly, founded credibly challenging i found it incredibly challenging juggling the responsibilities of the job and fulltime parenting. This baby is my fourth, so i had the kids at home fulltime and needed fulltime attention and a job that needed fulltime attention. For my first reaction to your question is to think about the logistics. It was was true for me, maybe doubly true for staff across the agency, just like it is for people working from home whether theyuntry, have small children in their house, elderly that they are taking care of, sick family members, or are dealing with we cannot discount the human toll that this pandemic has taken, even as we try to perceive with our extremely important work. Commissioner slaughter, how has the agenda changed since march . That is a great question. I will say a couple things. First thing is, we had and continue to have an incredibly full docket of casework that we cannot and will not let slip. Merger andes ongoing acquisition reviews, ongoing Consumer Protection cases, and antitrust conduct investigations, those will not go away just because the pandemic appeared. But there was more additional work with the pandemic, including an onslaught of coronavirusrelated scams and frauds. Everything from fraud related to loans, and people peddling for selling ppee cures, and not delivering, those were all issues the agency has taken up, which is new to the pandemic. In the antitrust arena, i am particularly concerned of the potential for and the possibility we are seeing of an uptake uptake in acquisitions that are competitively concerning. People basically taking advantage of the pandemic. That is a huge amount of work that is a result of the Economic Uncertainty that we are facing. It is one that we have to rise to meet. Politico into this conversation to explore. Hose issues you mentioned you are awarehat that President Trump signed an executive order in may saying the fcc considered taking action with public representation. Your thoughts on the executive order and you think that the fcc should take action . It is difficult to see what action we could take consistent with our legal mandate and responsibilities under the order. We are not political speech police, nor should we be. I found the order kind of confounding from a legal basis, and not really one that would i would findaction myself supporting. Democrat had targeteda study on how advertising incentive incentivizes policies implemented in the state. You think you could support such a study . Yes, i think that is a good idea. I also talked about how we would do a study on targeted advertising. I think there is an enormously opaque black box into which our data goes that is turned around and used, targets content towards us. Whether political, commercial, some might be manipulative, some fraudulent, and better understanding that ecosystem is a normatively important enormously important. There might be three of you who support that. The think you might be first to observe that at least three of us think it would be a great idea. I want to move on to a slightly pandemic related issue. The beginning of the school year has been different. Tomany schools are moving virtual learning, either parttime or fulltime. What advice do you have her parents who have concerns about their kids privacy online . The first thing i have is sympathy. I am right there with them. I have two Elementary School age kids and had to transition to an all Digital Learning environment with the suite of new technologies that we as parents cannot choose. Even if we wanted to, and even if we had the time to do the digging to figure out what is itng whos data in what way, would be too high to even contemplate. I say that from the position of somebody who has a job in this economy, and one that is fortunate enough to do my job at home and be available to my children, and has the most i can wish for in terms of resources of devices and Internet Connection and other things that are needed to make Digital Learning possible. None of the things i concerned about right now one of the things i am concerned about right now is the way that the Digital Divide is exacerbating issues butese privacy issues as well and children. We should talk about general divide issues for people who have Broadband Access and have to sit in parking lots of libraries and stores in order to get online for school. I am also worried about the ways in which the Digital Divide exacerbates ivc gaps where privacy gaps where wealthy children can pay for Protection Services and more access to things and low income children have to pay with their privacy. That is a problem that has proceeded pandemic, but has been exacerbated. That is not just school programs, but whenever your kids are doing during the day, which includes a lot more screen time and prepandemic. Referred he told the toldrce committee you the Commerce Committee that these are equity and civil rights issues. What did you mean by that . We cant divorce the questions of how data is used and abused from the question of how that is done differentially across different demographic groups. Not r words, it is even if it is primarily economically correlated, we also know it is racially correlated how different groups have different access to data and higherpaying services, and that structural inequity persists into questions of privacy. We have to be particularly careful and i think communities of color have to be particularly sensitive in the ways in which not used, problem problematically for communities in color. There is Academic Work on this including issues like algorithmic and surveillance technology. I do not pretend to have the answers, but i am very concerned about the dynamic. Does the ftc have a role in solving those issues that you describe . To the extent that our job across our mission area is to protect consumers then we should absolutely be protecting the most vulnerable consumers and though much of our statute and mandates do not explicitly contemplate racial inequality, does contemplate other issues that directly reflect racial inequality in america today. I think that is part of the conversation that we are having and should be having and continue to have. Last year, the comments on ther to update the roles which was one of the laws that the ftc enforces related to childrens privacy. Can you give us an update on where that stands right now . Sure, thanks. I think one of the best things does the law is that it give Rulemaking Authority that allows us to review and update the requirements around the law to make sure that we are keeping cases that involve technology. Technology is evolving so rapidly, and we have not appreciated that or than we have in the last year, i think. The last time it was updated was about eight or so years ago and that is eight lifetimes in terms of children technology. Periodically reviewing rules, making sure they are working, seeing if there are better ways for them to work, and making sure we understand the technological ecosystem with which we are dealing. Is thatnd instance rulemaking is the only way to get that understanding is not the only way to get that understanding, particularly with respect to the ad tech domain, and how that affects children is also something we should be doing and would be valuable for us to have before any rulemaking is finalized. I do not want to be too prescriptive, and keeping an open mind about what it should look like, but it is extremely important to me that it be fully informed and we really understand what we are dealing with so that the rules we prescribe work well because there is no point in having them if they are not going to work well. Has the pandemic affected your thinking on this . The pandemic has certainly affected the ecosystem in which we are dealing with in terms of childrens technology. I think it would be shortsighted to not take a breath and take into account the new technologies that have emerged, the way children are interacting with elegy, with technology and what implications that has. I want to talk about antitrust, my favorite topic. Hearingse a series of on the state of antitrust at the beginning of the trip administration. The House Judiciary Committee has also had hearings on the same topic, and they might propose changes to antitrust laws based on their findings. What advice do you have for members of congress as they consider that . I love talking about antitrust. It is really exciting to me in the first instance that this has become a topic of focus of Public Interest and congressional interest. I think certainly in the time that i have been working in congress, i never saw even a fraction of this amount of attention to antitrust and it is an important topic that affects the entire structure of our economy. I am excited to see the interest and see the attention, particularly because i think a lot of enforcement efforts have by badmstrung or setback Court Decisions that limited and thatnforcement Congress Really needs to attack. All,nk that, first of folks in congress doing this work are doing it very thoughtfully and carefully and not need need to tell them how to do it, but i am confident that among the things they are looking at our court cases are court cases that have limited enforcement and how those might be changed, and also some of the structural burdens and structural barriers that enforces face. I hope they will also take a close look at Resource Management too. Concerned and continue to be that we are under resourced compared to the mandate in front of us, especially on the antitrust side. We do not decide how many mergers and visions get filed. That is work that comes mergers and acquisitions yet filed. That is work that comes to us. We see anrned that increase in volume of work without a measured increase in resources. That means we cannot do the work as well. Of that, iding any do not think the agency should be waiting for congress to do our own examination of what we can be doing differently and better. I said it was good to revisit the rule to see that it is working, i think we should be applying that same lens to our antitrust enforcement and figure out what we could be doing differently to make our enforcement more effective, where it is possible. I think we need to be a bit more skeptical of mergers, more aggressive on enforcement. You can think about remedies carefully, and i think we need stepping back and taking a big picture look on our priorities and how we can hone and improve them. Commissioner slaughter, there have been investigations of big pack when it comes to antitrust. What are your views on that big tech when it comes to antitrust. What are your views on that . Commentl not make any on decisions. But i will echo that when you have these companies, you are likely to find antitrust problems. Of course you should be investigating them, and in an area where there has been notwed continuous, politically, but out of academia and practitioners and participants in markets, to take a look at questions about anticompetitive conduct. Of course we should be looking lawhat stuff and follow the and not be afraid to pursue violations when we find them. The last hearing they had, amazon, of apple, google, and facebook were questioned by members of congress. I wonder if you tuned into that and had any thought . I thought it was interesting. I think it is great to see congressional investigations Law Enforcement investigations are happening because they can play different roles and purposes. I just said, Law Enforcement investigations we cannot talk about what is happening, they do not theyre not particularly transparent. That is for good reason and i understand that. I think it is also understood important for the public to understand what is happening in these cases and for companies to be accountable to the public just as they are to lawenforcement. The hearing served at goal goal really that well and i was impressed by their ability to pull that off the middle of a pandemic with everybody scattered everywhere and everything on congresss plate. Had ant a week ago, you interesting post on twitter about using antitrust to promote racial equity. Talk about your thoughts on that and how would that work in your view . The reason i thought this was important to talk about is as i mentioned, at the beginning of time when, a nationwide protests were springing up, i wasnt doing a lot of public speaking or en gaging in public debate because i think it is important for parents to feel to take a step away from their work when they have new babies. I have been thinking about these issues and the National Conversation we are having an out of that to me is doing a lot of introspective work about how i can be part of the solution to some real profound, structural problems. Structural racism in this country. One thing that has struck me as bizarre about antitrust, even before this conversation, is the practitionersrust has really seen itself as valueneutral. That has been a principal that has been espoused principle that has been espoused. But this idea that it should be anti a political and valueneutral, i have never understood. It has never made a lot of sense to me. Let explain that a little bit. In every other area of Law Enforcement, we are perfectly comfortable with law enforcers setting policy priorities consistent with Public Policy values. For example, a criminal prosecutor who is putting people in jail, and the normas enormously hi an states and devil, saying im going to prioritize violent as this indicate administration, immigration crime. Withn agree or disagree the priorities but we dont disagree with them setting those priorities. I dont understand why antitrust is the only area of Law Enforcement we dont think like that or we are not comfortable saying we think like that. At the end of the day, i dont think enforcement is ever value neutral. Just like i dont think we can ever live in a functionally race lined society. Sorry my lamp just fell down. I was saying that i think being race blind is one of those things that sounds like an aspirational goal but in reality, it lays out it plays out only to advance the dominant race or white people. I think being reportedly value neutral on antitrust reinforces social inequities. And in terms of specifically what i mean about antitrust being antiracist, i mean we should be conscious of the effects hour of force meant our enforcement should have on our system and prioritize enforcement that makes our Economic System more equitable rather than less. , we already Prioritize Health care enforcement. We have a whole division devoted to Health Care Enforcement and i think that is great and really important. Not just because health care is peopleng where ordinary feel the pinch of concentration , but becausere health care is an area with enormous disparities among racial lives. Prioritizing including improving quality of health care to consumers and paying attention to transparency or the outcomes for patients of color an important thing. It is entirely consistent with our mandate and close to how we are functioning. Find that blend in other areas is important. Leah thank you. You have been in the minority at the ftc since you joined in 2018, but if the former Vice President wins in november, democrats will be in change of agency. Should joe biden win, what would you like to see as a priority . In the last several years, as long as ive been doing this, theres been a lot of unity in the democratic among and even president ial candidates about what we should be doing with the authority we have, and most of that includes more and better. More targeted enforcement in some of the ways ive talked about, and making our enforcement more effective. Which means making sure the cases we bring we resolve in ways that help the most consumers. For me, that often means having a really powerful deterrent effect. For example, i was concerned about our facebook settlement because i did not think it would adequately deter future bad behavior. I want to make sure when we bring cases we resolve them in ways we dont have to bring the same case again. I focused on some of those things. Ofhink the ftc has a lot Rulemaking Authority that has not been adequately explored, including on the Consumer Protection side and unfair methods of competition on the antitrust side. My colleague has written a very good law review article raising that issue. They deserve a lot of credit for servicing and authority that had been broadly discounted at the ftc for a long time. I think those things are important and also restoring some alilance to some of t