Lina Khan

Lina M. Khan (born March 3, 1989) is an American legal scholar and chair of the Federal Trade Commission. While a student at Yale Law School, she became known for her work in antitrust and competition law in the United States after publishing the influential essay "Amazon's Antitrust Paradox". She was appointed by President Joe Biden to the Commission in March 2021, and has served since June 2021. She is also an associate professor of law at Columbia Law School.

Khan was born in London, United Kingdom on March 3, 1989 to Pakistani parents. Khan moved with them to the United States when she was 11 years old. In 2010, she graduated from Williams College, where she wrote her thesis on Hannah Arendt. During her time at Williams College, Khan served as the editor of the student newspaper.

After graduation, she went to work at the New America Foundation, where she did anti-monopoly research and writing for Barry Lynn at the Open Markets Program. Lynn was looking for a researcher without a background in economics, and he began critiquing market consolidation with Khan's help. She earned a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 2017, where she was a submissions editor of the Yale Journal on Regulation.

After completing her studies, Khan worked as legal director at the Open Markets Institute. The institute split from New America after Khan and her team criticized Google's market power, prompting pressure from Google, a funder of New America. During her time at OMI, Khan met with Senator Elizabeth Warren to discuss anti-monopolistic policy ideas.

Following her appointment as chairperson at the FTC, both Amazon.com Inc. and Facebook, filed petitions with the FTC seeking her recusal from investigations of the companies, suggesting that her past criticism of the companies left her unable to be impartial. However, according to legal scholar Eleanor Fox, the standard for recusal is very high and unlikely to be met for Khan. Senator Elizabeth Warren and other supporters of Khan argued that the recusal demands amount to an attempt by these companies to intimidate Khan in order to curtail regulatory scrutiny.

In October 2021, the FTC sued Xlear, Inc. for falsely claiming their nasal sprays can prevent and treat COVID-19. The Commission had voted to refer the civil penalty complaint to the Department of Justice for filing, but Chair Lina M. Khan did not participate in the vote.