The U.S. Senate confirmed Columbia Professor Lina Khan Commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on June 15, 2021. President Biden appointed her chairperson on the same day. Notably, this makes Khan the youngest FTC Chair, and just the third Asian-American to serve on the commission.
Prior to this, Khan made her name as an award-winning writer. She additionally received widespread recognition as an eminent scholar on antitrust and competition policy. For example, the Harvard Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Columbia Law Review, and University of Chicago Law Review have all published her scholarship.
Several publications have also honored Khan, including the Politico 50, Foreign Policy magazine’s Global Thinkers, and Time magazine’s Next Generation Leaders.
Lina Khan: the antitrust scholar
In 2018 Khan worked as a legal adviser in the Office of FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra. Prior to this she was Legal Director the anti-monopoly organization Open Markets Institute.
Next, from 2019-2020, Khan served as a Counsel on the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law. During this time, the panel conducted a 16-month investigation into the effect large tech companies have over the digital economy.
While serving as FTC Chair, Khan is on leave from an Associate Professor of Law position at Columbia University. She began there as an Academic Fellow for the law school in 2018.
In 2018 Khan won the Antitrust Writing Award for Best Academic Unilateral Conduct Article for her piece “Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox.” Specifically, the famed article argued for new anti-competition laws to curb the monopoly power of large online platforms.
In 2019 Khan won Best Antitrust Article on Remedies. The Jerry S. Cohen Memorial Fund awarded her article “The Separation of Platforms and Commerce.” Then, in 2020, Khan received the Antitrust Writing Award for Best General Antitrust Academic Article. She also co-authored the article “The Case for ‘Unfair Methods of Competition’ Rulemaking.”
Lina Khan started on the path to journalism
Khan was born in London, United Kingdom in 1989. Her parents, Pakistani immigrants, work in management consulting and information services. She came to the U.S., specifically New York, with her family at 11 years old.
“Coming of age after 9/11, as a Muslim, our community was just under a lot of skepticism and scrutiny,” she said. She remembers her family members being treated like “potential terrorists” and “”would always get pulled over at the airport.”
She then went on to marry Pakistani American cardiologist Shah Ali in 2018. He is on the faculty of the University of Texas southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.
Khan earned her B.A. in Political Theory from Williams College in 2010 and her J.D. from Yale Law School in 2017. Originally, she aspired to become a journalist for The Wall Street Journal. To this end, she served as editor of the student newspapers The Williams Record at Williams College and of Yale’s Yale Law Journal.
“I realized that the law is one of our main tools for dealing with monopolies,” Khan explained to Time magazine. “And if a major reason why we’re living with so much concentration of private power, is that the law is broken, being a lawyer seemed a useful way to start to address that.”
Lina Khan: the youngest FTC Chair
The youngest FTC chairperson in history, Khan was sworn in at 32 years old. Earlier the same day, the Senate confirmed Khan as Commissioner by a vote of 69-28.
“It is a tremendous honor to have been selected by President Biden to lead the Federal Trade Commission,” Khan said in a statement. “I look forward to working with my colleagues to protect the public from corporate abuse. I’m very grateful to Acting Chairwoman Slaughter for her outstanding stewardship of the Commission.”
President Biden initially announced his nomination for Khan as Commissioner in March. She filled the vacancy left in January by Republican-appointed chair Joseph Simons. The term expires September 25, 2024.
“Over its 107 years, the Commission has navigated various periods of change and transformation,” Chair Khan stated in a September memorandum. “At its best, the agency has focused on tackling urgent problems, learning from new evidence, and course-correcting where needed. American consumers, workers, and honest businesses depend on the Commission to champion a fair and thriving economy for all, and I am confident that we can deliver.”
