US: Elizabeth Warren wants stronger antitrust enforcement

On Wednesday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren took on Comcast, the telecom company, which she said serves more than half of the nation’s cable and internet subscribers.

“Last year was Comcast’s best year in nearly a decade,” the Massachusetts Democrat said in prepared remarks for a speech. “But while big telecom giants have been consuming each other, consumers have been left out in the cold — facing little or no choice in service providers and paying through the nose for cable and internet service.

Warren’s speech at a forum on monopolies came as part of her advocacy for greater enforcement of antitrust laws as American consumers pay higher prices for cable and Internet services than those elsewhere.

Warren cited the cable giant specifically, along with technology players like Apple and Google, the big airlines and Wal-Mart. While the Obama administration has blocked some deals, the US has been through a strong period of business consolidation.

“Strong executive leadership could revive antitrust enforcement in this country and begin, once again, to fight back against dominant market power and overwhelming political power,” Warren said in the Capitol Visitor Center. “But we need something else too — and that’s a revival of the movement that created the antitrust laws in the first place.”

Warren said that federal regulators and the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission should be more aggressive about blocking mergers and acquisitions.

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