Fired FTC commissioner warns of the ‘corrupting influence of billionaires’

by Shivendra Singh · March 20, 2025

Alvaro Bedoya, commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), during a House Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, July 13, 2023. The Federal Trade Commission chair is set for a grilling by House Republicans who’ve been sharply critical of her approach to antitrust and are sure to raise what they say are management missteps and ethical issues. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

President Donald Trump’s sudden and unlawful firing of the Federal Trade Commission’s two remaining Democrats will serve the tech billionaires who backed him, not the American people, warned one of the ousted officials today.

“I think we need to be focused on the billionaires over President Trump’s shoulder at his inauguration and what this attempt will do for them,” Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya said in some of his first live remarks since the firing, at a hearing before the Colorado state legislature. “Above all else, we need to be asking ourselves, who will win from this attempt to illegally remove us, and frankly, who will lose?”

Bedoya and his fellow Democratic Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter were both fired by Trump on Tuesday evening in what they call an illegal removal from an independent …read more