Hey, I'm Michael Lohinger. You're listening to the On the Media podcast Extra. Back in March 2021,

when President Joe Biden announced Lena Khan's nomination for Chair of the Federal Trade Commission,

the decision was met with a rare kind of excitement for the otherwise sleepy agency.

She is a noted and vocal critic of Big Tech also, one of the leading academics on antitrust.

By the way, she's only 32 years old and she's leading one of the top federal agencies.

Even some Republicans were jazzed about her appointment, including Ted Cruz.

Ms. Khan, congratulations on your nomination. As you know, I have deep concerns about Big Tech.

And I believe the FTC should be doing much more to rein in the anti-competitive abuses of Big Tech.

I look forward to working with you on them. Thank you.

Since then, the tone around Khan has changed dramatically. Republican commissioners at the agency

have pushed back against what they see as a radical agenda. And just last month,

Khan was questioned by the House Judiciary Committee for her role in pushing for legal action

against Big Tech companies, including Google and Twitter.

Khan was accused of mismanagement and for politicizing her role as a Big Tech Trust Buster.

Today, it is the Chair of the Federal Trade Commission's turn to step into the alternate

universe that is the House Judiciary Committee under MAGA Republican leadership.

Emily Burnbaum covers tech lobbying and influence for Bloomberg.

I spoke to her in March after an article she'd written,

identified a growing anti-antitrust movement emerging in the press and in Washington.

I asked her to tell me about how Khan came to be chosen as chairperson in the first place.

Yeah, Lena Khan rose to prominence in a really unorthodox way, at least for Washington.

It was a really popular article, the Amazon's anti-trust paradox, that really catapulted her into

...