Welcome to the center for American Progress, i am the executive Vice President of external affairs. Im so delighted that you could join us today. In our recent report reviving antitrust, it highlighted the idea that the economy has grown more consolidated with more power be good time concentrated in the largest firms in america. This is in no small part of the conservative assault on both government and the middle class. This assault has played out not just in the courts, but in antitrust enforcement practices of the department of justice, the federal trade commission, and at a wider range of federal regulators and in the halls of congress, where the view that big meant more efficient, has dominated for far too long. Since the early 1980s, conservative legal thinking embodied in robert bork and antonin scalia, has sought to dismantle the ability of government to protect consumers, workers, Small Businesses, the environment, people of color, basically all of us ordinary folks, from the abuses of markets and large corporations. Unfortunately, the Trump Administration is going precisely in the wrong direction. Trump has appointed billionaires and ideologues to his cabinet that seek to strip the government of these tools to protect the public. He has appointed a chair of the federal Communications Commission that seems perfectly comfortable with rising industry consolidation and limited privacy protections. And he has nominated a Supreme Court justice promotes a legal philosophy aimed at enabling even greater concentration of economic power. So what does this mean for ordinary americans . Market consolidation means sky high drug prices and airline tickets. Small businesses shut out of markets. Lower wages. Less innovation and choice. An even broader trends like the deindustrialization of the midwest. In fact, i dont think its an exaggeration to say such concentration of economic power plays a big role in why conservatives in Congress Want to pass massive tax cuts for corporations and rolled black wall street reform while ignoring communities in need like flint, michigan. That is not something ordinary americans sitting around the Kitchen Table want to see more of. Given these threats, we need lawmakers like senator amy klobuchar, the senior senator from the state of minnesota who is speaking today, about a critical piece of this puzzle, the need for vigorous antitrust enforcement in an era of increasing market concentration. In a town like the seed that is not known for its friendliness, senator klobuchar brings a refreshing dash of minnesota nice. But do not mistake her collegiality for softness. [inaudible] [laughter] a former county prosecutor and the first female senator from minnesota, senator klobuchar also brings an i in range toughness to washington. The daughter of a journalist and Public School teacher, senator klobuchar is a fighter for middleclass families in minnesota and across the nation. As the Ranking Member of the subcommittee on antitrust competition, policy, and consumer rights, the senator has long been an advocate for from railroads to drug pricing, senator klobuchar has been a fighter for lower prices, higher the quality and fairness for Small Businesses. We need more leaders like her in washington. Please join me in welcoming the honorable senator amy klobuchar. [applause] senator klobuchar thank you. We were so excited to walk in and see the soldout crowd for antitrust discussion. My antitrust counsel said it was the best day of his life. It is wonderful to be here with all of you. Thank you for your leadership, center for American Progress, or all you are doing. Before i was a senator, before i was a prosecutor for eight years, i was a lawyer. At one point early on in my career, a client that did the most work for over the years was mci. This was at a time when they were a scrappy company that was taking on the Bell Companies and getting into the market. Eventually, when i was representing them, trying to create competition in the local markets as well. It was truly an exciting time to be representing a young, hungry company. Mcis scrappy lawyers viewed themselves as cowboys of sorts, they were fighting for consumers and lower prices, they were taking on the local telephone monopolies across the country. One of the stories, i remember i told one of my opening arguments, at an exciting regulatory hearing, was recalling that when Alexander Graham bell developed the telephone, when the whole system started to work, he said those historic words. Them . Nyone remember watson. Re, i need you. This is like lore of telecommunications. Fast forward now to mci and the last few decades, and they were finally getting ready to connect the first communication between st. Louis and chicago. One of their main guys, when this great moment occurred, he said the words, the modern day ill be dammed, it actually works. Ok. But without antitrust law, mci would never have worked. Mci took on Bell Operating Company and at t and ultimately broke of that monopoly. Lowered longdistance prices for consumers across the country and revolutionized the telecom industry. Now i know that antitrust law may not make frontpage news or even capture the attention of all of our lawmakers at any one moment, but it is important stuff. It is consequential. Look at the newspaper over the weekend. South korea, the president there recently impeached, based in part on allegations she participated in a bribery scheme that ordered Government Support of a merger. Or here in the u. S. , the Nixon Administration concluded during watergate that the best way to intimidate the nations three Major Television networks was to keep the constant threat of an antitrust suit hanging over them. We all know how that ended. I think the American People intuitively understand that there is too much concentration in this country, even if they dont always describe it that way. In fact, two thirds of americans, including a majority of republicans, have come to believe that the economy unfairly favors powerful interest. Even as our economy has stabilized and grown stronger, it is easy to see why people feel that way. Every year i visit all 87 counties in my state. This is something that i know Chuck Grassley does, and Chuck Schumer does it. Chuck schumer actually gave me the idea to start doing it. Although i later found out, after years of doing this, he had an election and he won every county except his smallest one. He went to his chief of staff and said, i dont understand, i practically met every person in that county. The chief of staff said, that was the problem. But what i have found is that visiting all of these counties really gives me a sense of where people are in rural america, in a way that i dont think you can get by just looking at newspaper clips or talking to your staff. Just in the last month, i was in 20 rural counties, at farms, everything from a ducks unlimited gathering for a bunch of guys to a meeting in a township. Hard to pay for internet, prescription drugs, hard to get that loan if they want to start something new. They want Common Sense Solutions. That is why, when you look at the rural economy, net income, 50 of what it was from a few years ago. That is from the farmers union. Poverty rate for kids in the rural areas is four Percentage Points higher than in urban areas. No one gets affected by the economic concentration more than if you are out in places that have less choices and less competition. So strengthening that rural economy, for me, needs not only doing something about prescription drugs, getting broadband out there, passing the farm bill, but its also making sure we have actual competition, and that we vigorously enforce our antitrust law. If you dont think that major mergers, whether it is ag or cable or health care, impact people, especially in places where there is a bare margin on cost, i think those numbers i gave you is all the evidence you need. That is why this antitrust enforcement is so important. Some people may ask, what does a Strong Economy have to do with antitrust . The answer is everything. Antitrust has everything to do with our broader economy. You have heard much of this before. When companies are allowed to compete, businesses can offer the highest quality goods for the lowest possible price. That is capitalism. But what i want to emphasize is that talking only about antitrust in the way the price is is over civil side. Antitrust enforcement affects more than just the prices of people pay for the goods they buy. We now have evidence that competition fosters Small Business growth. If you just have big people dominating, its hard to get into the market. It reduces inequality. The people most affected by these high prices are the people at the bottom of the income scale. So they will be most affected if you have concentration. Also, you have a decrease in innovation when you have too much concentrated power. That is something i will come back to. I think its really important. What do we see coming from the courts . In the last few decades, the Supreme Court cases, maybe one of our panelists can discuss that. Credit suisse, legion, among others, have actually raised barriers to the pursuit of antitrust cases. So our Supreme Court nominee, as you know, is an expert on antitrust. I think it is more than important to pursue this in the hearings coming up, what his views are on the trend of the court and what has been happening to antitrust law in recent decades. So lets go back to why this matters. Concentrated interest makes it nearly impossible for entrepreneurs and Small Business owners to compete. Firms with fewer than 20 workers make up 90 of the businesses in this country. So you can imagine, if you start having all of this concentration, you will be taking a gouge out of the american economy. When there are eight or 10 competitors, this gets to the innovation argument, they will compete to innovate. They will compete to offer the next fitbit or whatever else. When you only have one or two firms, that is not going to happen. Because they dont want to innovate, they are happy with the status quo. Why do they want innovation . Think of your Cable Company and the cable box. Nobody likes the cable box, but for years, the Cable Company made no modifications and continually increased rental rates. Recently, only recently, competition alike apple tv and roku have improved the viewing experience and expanded choice. Competition drives innovation. If that is too technical, how about beer . For years, there were a few dominant carriers, they sold a similar massmarket beer. We see it in the super bowl ads. By 1978 there were fewer than 50 breweries nationwide. That across the country entrepreneurs started what we call the craft brewing revolution. By the way, where were the jobs . They were small craft brewers, they tended to use more american ingredients, they innovated, increased choices, and improve quality. Today in my state alone we have over 70 craft brewers, more than the entire country had back in 1978. I will not go into the dirty topic that some of the big guys are now trying to buy up the small guys and some of the antitrust concerns and why we had our beer hearing, which was the most widely attended antitrust hearing in the history of america a few years back. What did we call it . The beerhemoth merger. That was pretty witty, we have to work hard to make this exciting. Trying to make the case for you today that this is not only important but cool to talk about, because it is all about what will happen with the economy. Research suggests, as i noted, concentration increases income inequality. Firms with monopolies raise prices, taking money from consumers and putting in the pockets of owners and employees. The consumers who spend the money far outnumbers the employees. So we have to recognize the broader benefits of antitrust enforcement, especially today. Now we are going to get to the facts of the current state. Since 2008, american firms have engaged in 10 trillion in acquisitions. Over the last five years, there was a 50 increase in mergers reviewed by the ftc and the department of justice antitrust division. There are signs of anticompetitive concentration everywhere. As former chair and Ranking Member of the antitrust subcommittee, i raised concerns of these my proposals during the last few years. Take for example comcasts failed merger with time warner. As we pointed out in our senate hearing, if the merger was approved, the combined company would have approved controlled 60 of the countrys highspeed content customers. Or the failed merger between Norfolk Southern railway and canadian pacific, something i took on immediately after it was announced. Even without the merger, 90 of freight traffic is handled only by four railroads. As i like to note on this topic, how many railroads are on the monopoly board . Four. No coincidence. These examples are part of a larger pattern. Last year, the assistant attorney general for antitrust, a lifelong antitrust practitioner, said his agency was dealing with such serious antitrust concerns, they should of never made it out of the Corporate Board room. And there is more reason for concern. Like the fact that 83 of companies own 25 of profit or more in 2003 were still achieving those profit levels a decade level. Although firms may exploit an advantage in the shortterm, winners and losers should change over time in a competitive market. It should be the case in the american economy. Or the fact that prices in america should be lower than other countries because the market is so large. But in general, american prices are not lower than in countries with smaller markets. All of this suggests that more than ever we need vigorous antitrust enforcement, especially in light of the stakes. There are new types of activities to consider as well. Large Institutional Investors own almost 70 of the stock market. For example, the largest shareholders of apple and microsoft are blackrock and vanguard. We see this pattern in pharmacies, soft drink producers, and the banks. It is easy to see how this crop ownership can hurt consumers even many are also rightfully concerned that conditions the agencies place on mergers often fail, and that more deals must be blocked. I cannot tell you how many fake content providers in the media market and other things come to our offices. They cannot really they dont want to go public because they are afraid they will be screwed if they do it. But they tell us about what happens. A lot of these merger conditions are not being implemented. In fact, they are not getting a good deal, not able to move forward, despite the fact that some of these conditions were put on. So that is a big concern. The ftc disagrees. Im just looking at what i see. If it is not a problem, great. But you will see the proposal i have in a little bit to create some kind of check and balance, promises made at mergers. As merger deals have grown, so often have the complexities of the settlements. We often talk about firms being too big to fail. A question from modern antitrust enforcement is whether some mergers are simply too big to fix. So here is the billiondollar question. And im not using that number loosely because so many of these mergers are billiondollar mergers. What are we going to do about this . One question is obvious. More aggressive antitrust enforcement to prevent concentration and monopolies. Heres the good news, antitrust and competition polities are not republican or democratic issues, they are consumer issues. They have tended to be more focused on by the democratic party. I think that is important to note. I will say that mike lee and i, he is kind of a tea Party Background and have worked well on these issues together, painstakingly work on ideas and other things when we work with the antitrust division, and they have told us repeatedly how helpful it is for them. In fact, these are bipartisan suggestions, ideas for conditions and others. So we get down to the bad news. The federal governments commitment to antitrust enforcement has declined. Our economy, in terms of nominal gdp, has increased by over 20 between 2010 and 2016. Merger filings have increased by over 50 . At the same time, our antitrust Agency Budgets have been flat. Because antitrust agencies are only able to litigate cases involving the most highly concentrated markets, they often cannot deal with new issues, like the one i mentioned, Investment Fund cross ownership of competing firms within an industry. Still, these agencies are doing the best they can, and we have seen real results. In 2015, the department of justice obtained a record 3. 6 billion in criminal antitrust fines. That probably surprises you. 3. 6 billion in fines. The antitrust divisions entire operating budget is roughly 5 of that figure. What is incredible is that the division is actually a moneymaker. If we have people that are interested in making money, this is one way to do it. The ftc has six antitrust cases in active litigation last year, including blocking staples proposed acquisition of office depot, and for hospital mergers. Most recently, the antitrust division successfully litigated to the viewer maker mergers in the insurance industry, including anthem and cigna. The chairman and i held a subcommittee hearing on the effects of those mergers on consumers. But we need the agencies to do more, and we need the new administration to take this seriously. Some might argue that president trump, who has been both a plaintiff and a defendant in antitrust lawsuits, might be one that would champion increased enforcement efforts. We hope that will be true. So here is just a little fun fact for you to take away. He was both a