Decoder with Nilay Patel
Episode: "Decoder Live: Fired FTC Commissioners Fight Back"
Date: April 28, 2025

Episode Overview

This special live-recorded episode of Decoder features a candid and urgent conversation between host Nilay Patel and recently fired Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya. Recorded at the IAPP Global Privacy Summit in Washington, D.C., the panel dives into the legality of President Trump's controversial decision to fire the two Democratic commissioners, their legal challenge against the administration, the ripple effects for American regulatory institutions, and the current and future role of the FTC in antitrust, privacy, and artificial intelligence (AI) oversight.

Key Topics & Discussion Points

1. The Unprecedented Firing of FTC Commissioners

• Background: Traditionally, FTC commissioners can't be fired by the President except for cause (neglect, malfeasance, or inefficiency), a protection established by statute (over a century ago) and a 90-year-old Supreme Court precedent (Humphrey’s Executor).
• Event: On March 18, 2025, both Slaughter and Bedoya received impersonal emails from the presidential personnel office “purporting” to terminate them—no calls, PDFs, or signed letters.
  • Slaughter’s recount: “So I stood up and I walked out of drama club to the courtyard and I called Alvaro and I said, hey man, have you checked your email?” (04:39)
  • Bedoya’s response: “…I picked it up, and Becca said, have you seen your email? And I said, actually, I haven’t seen my email. And she said, well, you should check your email because I just got an email purporting to fire me.” (06:08)
• Legal Grounds: Both are suing the Trump administration, confident in their case due to established law and precedent.
  • Slaughter: “The law says very explicitly that commissioners can only be removed for neglect, malfeasance or inefficiency... There is no cause.” (07:32)
• Systemic Implications: This legal fight is framed as essential not just for them, but for the independence of other regulatory agencies (Federal Reserve, SEC, FDIC, etc.).
  • Bedoya: “If the President can remove Commissioner Slaughter and I for any, for no reason at any time, he can do the same to Jay Powell at the Federal Reserve...” (10:21)

2. The Stakes for U.S. Independent Agencies

• Institutional Risk: Both commissioners warn of broader institutional chaos if removal protections for agency leaders are eroded.
  • Slaughter: “Can these agencies even exist? Can markets rely on the stability that they provide is a really important one.” (11:55)
• Recent Trump Actions: Referencing chaos as Trump threatened (and then walked back) firing other regulators like Fed Chair Jay Powell, affecting market stability.
  • Slaughter: “We are still in the same position of instability and uncertainty that markets have been reacting to with these wild fluctuations.” (13:01)

3. FTC’s Present & Future: Antitrust Cases against Meta and Amazon

Meta Case

• Independence of Enforcement: New FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson is “managing” the politics but signals he’ll obey the President’s directives.
  • Bedoya: “…just because he has not been fired does not mean he is not being influenced... if you obey, you will stay, and if you don’t, you won’t.” (14:07)
• Concerns about Influence: Perceived and actual influence of powerful tech figures and political donations (e.g. Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos) discussed as a threat to the rule of law and regulatory independence.
  • Slaughter: “Bribery is bad even if it doesn’t work... we are doing an enormous disservice to the rule of law...” (17:12)
  • Bedoya on Amazon’s donations and policy outcomes: “To have the nation’s leading workplace safety law enforcer be a former executive of your [Amazon] company, I think is astounding.” (18:18)

Amazon Case

• Litigation Details: The suit alleges Amazon abuses its market power to extract high fees from sellers and retaliates against those trying to compete off-platform—raising prices across the internet.
  • Slaughter: “…the evidence shows that their conduct was raising prices across not only on their own platform, but across the Internet...” (24:06)
  • Bedoya on Amazon’s monopolistic tactics: “We allege they slowly started jacking up the price of selling your goods on Amazon. So much so that eventually almost 50 cents of every dollar you made on that site had to go to Amazon.” (25:46)

4. The Evolution and Tension in Antitrust

• Market Definition in Meta Case: Discussed the difficulties in defining tech markets for antitrust purposes, with Patel noting “personal networking services” as a problematic, narrow category.
  • Slaughter: “What that case is really about is whether Meta bought competitors to eliminate the risk of competition.” (29:17)
• Impact on Privacy and Consumer Protection: Tight market control by tech giants weakens both consumer privacy and innovation.
  • Slaughter: “Without meaningful competition and the ability of customers to vote with their feet... you have an incentive to commit these violations...” (31:17)
  • Reflects how antitrust and consumer protection issues are increasingly intertwined at the FTC.

5. Regulating Tech in the Age of AI and Data Exhaustion

• Loss of Privacy and Regulation: The panel addresses the public’s sense of powerlessness in the face of mass data collection.
  • Patel: “...privacy is just lost, that it’s over, right? The data has been scraped, it’s gone.” (39:05)
• Need for Federal Privacy Law: Both call for minimization-focused laws over failed notice-and-consent regimes.
  • Slaughter: “Congress should pass a more specific privacy law... a minimization focused regulatory approach would make a lot more sense.” (40:13)
• Behavioral Shifts: People are changing habits (more guarded social media use, uptake of encrypted messaging) in response to privacy erosion.
  • Bedoya: “We haven’t lived in a world, I think, in recent memory where people have experienced what it is to have a meaningful online life with privacy.” (41:47)
• Consequences of Deregulation: Differences with the EU will likely result in a fragmented “splinternet” and harm consumers and U.S. businesses alike.
  • Slaughter: “Privacy is a legal value in Europe in a way that it is not in the US...” (46:46)

6. AI Hype and FTC's Role

• AI Claims Critiqued: Tech executives make “digital God” promises about AI eliminating doctors, which the commissioners dub idiocy and marketing “puffery.”
  • Bedoya: “The idea there will be no doctors in the future. How long have we had printers? How well does your printer work? ... This idea is inane and should not be treated with any degree of respect.” (49:28)
  • *Slaughter on AI: “There is no AI exception to the law. ... We apply the same rules, which are you can’t misrepresent what your product can do...” (50:49)
• Children and AI: Slaughter highlights unique risks to children from AI chatbots and the difficulty of establishing appropriate protections.
  • Slaughter: “We made the referral public. And the general series of allegations involving the way SNAPS AI chatbot interacted with children...” (53:04)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “It literally felt like somebody typed an email in their outlook.”
  — Rebecca Slaughter on the impersonal firing notice they received (07:02)

• “Bribery is bad even if it doesn't work.”
  — Rebecca Slaughter, emphasizing rule of law over influence-peddling (17:12)

• “If you obey, you will stay, and if you don’t, you won’t.”
  — Alvaro Bedoya, on the chilling effect of the president’s power over independent agencies (14:07)

• “We allege [Amazon] slowly started jacking up the price of selling your goods... almost 50 cents of every dollar... had to go to Amazon.”
  — Alvaro Bedoya, detailing the antitrust case (25:46)

• “Congress should pass a more specific privacy law... a minimization focused regulatory approach would make a lot more sense.”
  — Rebecca Slaughter on needed privacy reform (40:13)

• “There is no AI exception to the law.”
  — Rebecca Slaughter, on FTC’s role in AI oversight (50:49)

• “The idea there will be no doctors in the future... This idea is inane and should not be treated with any degree of respect.”
  — Alvaro Bedoya, refuting AI hype (49:28)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [04:39] – Rebecca Slaughter describes the moment she discovered her firing
• [07:32] – Legal explanation for why firing is unconstitutional
• [10:21] – Bedoya on risks to all independent agencies
• [13:33] – On the FTC’s ongoing antitrust cases amidst political chaos
• [14:07] – Disclosure about influence and pressure on the FTC
• [17:12] – “Bribery is bad even if it doesn't work.” (Slaughter)
• [18:18] – Bedoya details Amazon’s influence and related policy outcomes
• [24:06] – Slaughter on Amazon’s price-raising conduct
• [25:46] – Bedoya explains Amazon’s alleged fees and retaliation tactics
• [31:17] – How antitrust violations hurt consumer privacy
• [39:05] – Patel introduces public privacy nihilism & the “genie out of the bottle” problem
• [40:13] – Slaughter proposes new privacy law focused on data minimization
• [41:47] – Bedoya on Americans never experiencing online privacy
• [46:46] – Slaughter on consequences of U.S.–E.U. divergence in data regulation
• [49:28] – Bedoya and Slaughter tear down AI “digital God” claims
• [53:04] – Slaughter discusses children, AI, and FTC action against Snap

Tone & Language

The conversation is lively, candid, and occasionally darkly humorous. Nilay Patel’s hosting style blends journalistic skepticism with genuine curiosity, while both commissioners combine legal seriousness with human stories and sharp analogies.

Conclusion

This episode is an urgent, nuanced look at the sudden politicization of the FTC, the legal and philosophical stakes for America’s regulatory infrastructure, the ongoing battles against tech giants, and the future of privacy and AI regulation. The commissioners make a compelling case for the importance of institutional norms, transparent enforcement, and robust regulation, all while grappling with the uncertainties of 2025.