Biden’s Antitrust Advisor Left the White House. Here’s His Exit Interview

On with Kara Swisher

New York Magazine

Society & Culture

4.2 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 23 January 2023

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In his first extensive interview since he stepped down as the Special Assistant to the President for Technology and Competition Policy on the National Economic Council, Tim Wu shares what he learned in the West Wing. We find out who holds most sway with the President, how Lina Khan undid any perception that there is any antitrust exception for “nice guys,” and get Wu’s predictions on lawsuits against Google, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft. Also: Kara presses him on why Biden — who campaigned on getting rid of Section 230 and hinted at breaking up Big Tech — hasn’t been able to make much headway when it comes to regulating Silicon Valley. Before the interview, Kara and Nayeema look at exits, from Jacinda Ardern, the former prime minister of New Zealand, to Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings. And among all the exits, they also discuss one possible return: Meta’s looming decision regarding Donald Trump’s Facebook account. You can find Kara and Nayeema on Twitter at @karaswisher and @nayeema. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:26.0	and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money.
0:30.0	It's on!
0:42.0	Hi everyone from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network.
0:45.0	This is the West Wing and I'm president Josiah Bartlett.
0:48.0	Just kidding. I wish I was. This is on with Cara Swisher and I'm Cara Swisher.
0:52.0	And I'm Neymar Oz. I think I beat Josh Lyman.
0:55.0	That's correct. You were just like Josh Lyman.
0:57.0	I do lemon Lyman anyway.
0:59.0	Lemon Lyman. That's what you know.
1:01.0	I know. I know. I know.
1:03.0	So I'm not going to go into it with you anyways.
1:05.0	Our guest today is Tim Wu, who was special assistant to the president for technology and competition policy at the National Economic Council.
1:11.0	And he stepped down earlier this month.
1:13.0	Yeah he formed kind of an antitrust team in the Biden administration along with the FTC chair, Lena Khan.
1:18.0	And also Jonathan Cantor at the Justice Department who's had an antitrust and they even had mugs made as if they were a law firm.
1:25.0	And people thought it had a lot of promise.
1:27.0	You know, it's really difficult to make changes and shift things around.
	...

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