June 26, 2026, 11:59 GMT | Insight
Expensive lawsuits and the need to hire antitrust economists, lawyers and paralegals justifies the
US Federal Trade Commission's request for a nearly $45 million increase in the latest budget proposal, Chairman Andrew Ferguson told MLex.
Expensive lawsuits and the need to hire antitrust economists, lawyers and paralegals justifies the US Federal Trade Commission's request for a nearly $45 million increase in the latest budget proposal, Chairman Andrew Ferguson told MLex.
The FTC is seeking $426.7 million for the 2027 fiscal year. Ferguson said, "it is much more than the FY26 appropriation that I'm living under right now, which is $383.7 million."
In a budget plan sent to Congress in April, the FTC also asked for a total of 1,183 full-time staff as part of its budget request for the 2027 fiscal year. The $426.7 million appropriation request includes $213 million for promoting competition through antitrust enforcement and $213.1 million for consumer protection enforcement (see
here). Within the consumer protection budget, spending on privacy and identity protection would stay nearly flat at 71 full-time employees and $17.8 million in FY 2027.
"These cases are expensive. I have a couple of rulemakings that I launched with strong administration support to try to promote price transparency markets that we all have to use, but to do those right, to avoid cutting the corners that the Biden administration cut — they got all their rules shut down in court on purely procedural grounds — you need economists, you need paralegals, you need lawyers to do that work right," Ferguson told MLex in an interview.
"And in order to do these things that are administration priorities, I just need the bodies. And litigation cases are expensive, even the Bureau of Consumer Protection cases that used to be not expensive, you need experts on all these cases now. And the data we have to house for these cases, all terabytes and terabytes of data, even for cases that seem relatively straightforward in order to prove our cases," the FTC Chairman said.
The infrastructure to house data is very expensive to obtain, to house, and to analyze. However, these are cases that are popular which the Trump Administration wants the FTC to bring, he said.
Ferguson said the FTC's
Amazon antitrust case "is the most expensive case I have" (see
here).
The FTC is suing Amazon for alleged illegal monopolization, claiming that the ecommerce giant's actions allow it to stop rivals and sellers from lowering prices, degrading quality for shoppers. They allow it to overcharge sellers, stifle innovation and prevent rivals from fairly competing against Amazon.
"But in order to do these [cases], I need these resources. Look, like I'll be very honest with you, I think the fact that the administration asked for $383 million when we were inheriting the previous administration's FTC, it was an indication that Republicans were not happy with the direction of the FTC. The fact that the administration has gone back above the FY25 number is a pretty good indication that the administration likes what the FTC has been doing, even though we've been very aggressive and they want more of it," he said.
The FTC’s latest budget proposal continues to prioritize merger enforcement, especially premerger review of proposed transactions reported under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act. The FTC also published a five-year strategic plan that underscored the Trump Administration’s deregulatory priorities (see
here).
In its strategic plan, the agency also set a goal to save money on expert witnesses by training and using in-house economists as experts in litigation. In previous years, the FTC has expressed concerns over incurring high costs for enlisting external expert witnesses in complex litigation and warning that the expensive contractual obligations will likely remain "a top risk" in coming years (see
here and
here).
— Additional reporting by Mike Swift.
Please email editors@mlex.com to contact the editorial staff regarding this story, or to submit the names of lawyers and advisers.
Tags
Sections:
Antitrust, Data Privacy & Security, Mergers & Acquisitions, Technology, DealRisk®
Industries:
Professional Services
Geographies:
North America, United States
Topics:
In-Depth Merger Review, Market Abuse, Market Manipulation, Merger Block, Section 1 Sherman Act, Section 2 Sherman Act, Vertical Merger, Conglomerate Merger