 Thank you so much chairwoman Klobuchar ranking member Lee and members of the subcommittee I'm charlotte slayman competition policy director at public knowledge a non-profit working in the public interest It is an honor to be testifying today at this historic moment The new merger guidelines published this morning truly represent a watershed moment for antitrust enforcement and the American economy These new merger guidelines will be incredibly valuable for courts Antitrust practitioners business leaders and advocates The guidelines lay out clearly the types of mergers that risk substantially lessening competition in violation of the Clayton Act the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission have completed the Herculean task of bringing together the relevant precedents up-to-date economics research and distilling it into clear explanations of the law These new guidelines were written by experts in the field Interpreting the law clearly and fairly Together with the increased enforcement that we've seen in recent years. These guidelines can be an inflection point It has been exciting to witness the revitalization of antitrust enforcement that is currently underway at the FTC and DOJ in the past courts narrowed antitrust law and Congress cut antitrust budgets in Response antitrust enforcers narrowed their view of what they can achieve Though Congress charged them to protect competition and consumers Caution and formalism sometimes held our enforcers back from using the tools at their disposal to promote a competitive economy Where corporations compete for customers and workers today? Congress and antitrust enforcers recognize the importance of preserving competition and open markets through aggressive antitrust enforcement in Particular we've seen a marked increase in our federal enforcers suing to block vertical mergers This is something that public knowledge has been calling for for a long time The FTC and DOJ are to be commended for this impressive and important shift Vertical integration leaves consumers with fewer choices less innovation worse products and yes even higher prices Unfortunately, it appears that the courts have not yet come around to this perspective Antitrust law was written broadly which has allowed courts the flexibility to incorporate new economic learning over time This has given courts a lot more power in this area of the law than in many others The consumer welfare standard wasn't built in a day and fixing it purely through litigation will take some time as well The new merger guidelines published today can help immensely Courts should look to the new guidelines for the most up-to-date Understanding of competition law and economics, but Congress can and must do its part as well Americans cannot wait decades for their antitrust laws to slowly catch up with the market needs of today The competition and antitrust law Enforcement Reform Act Calera from Chairwoman Klobuchar and others would update the standard for merger review to help our antitrust enforcers Stop more mergers Sector-specific tools like the American Innovation and Choice Online Act the Open App Markets Act and the America Act are Critical to addressing the problems of vertical integration in digital platform markets Congress has already begun to support the increased antitrust enforcement effort by passing the merger filing fee Modernization Act last year giving more funding to our federal enforcers. Thank you For passing this important legislation However, I fear our federal enforcers are still resource constrained Facing more anti-competitive mergers than they have the resources to stop We call on Congress to authorize more funding for federal antitrust enforcement at the DOJ and FTC Our antitrust enforcement agencies are doing their part to promote competition throughout the economy They are bringing the cases we need to stop anticonpetitive mergers Consumer advocates have been sounding the alarm for years saying that existing antitrust law is not where it needs to be To address the harms of consolidation. We need Congress to do its part in this fight. Thank you