Adam Candeub, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday in a confirmation hearing that could determine the direction of federal antitrust cases against Google and Apple.
If confirmed, Candeub would take over the department’s lawsuits targeting Google’s dominance in online search and Apple’s control over its App Store rules for developers. He would also decide how aggressively the department pursues antitrust actions against the country’s largest technology companies going forward.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) opened the hearing by introducing Candeub alongside four other nominees, including Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals nominee Anna St. John. Grassley highlighted Candeub’s record on free speech.
“He’s also been a strong advocate for free speech, fighting censorship by social media companies during the Biden administration,” Grassley said in his prepared opening statement.
Candeub is a longtime telecommunications law scholar and former Federal Communications Commission general counsel. He clerked on the Ninth Circuit, spent nearly a decade in private practice, worked as an attorney-advisor at the FCC, and taught antitrust and criminal law for two decades at Michigan State University Law School. During Trump’s first term, he served as acting administrator of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration and as a deputy associate attorney general at the Justice Department. He is currently general counsel of the FCC.
In 2023 testimony to Congress, Candeub argued that dominant online platforms have accumulated outsized power over public discourse.
“Big Tech’s market power undermines our nation’s culture of vibrant democratic deliberation,” Candeub testified. “Elon Musk’s Twitter files demonstrated that Big Tech has indeed limited particular groups, including dissenters, from important government policies from full participation in national political discussions.”
“This power to exclude threatens all Americans,” he continued. “Power to silence one group of Americans will be used sooner or later to silence another.”
Candeub has also pushed to narrow Section 230, the federal law shielding online platforms from liability for user-posted content. In his contribution to Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s policy blueprint, he wrote that large internet platforms “have avoided significant antitrust liability or prosecution” despite their size, adding, “The reasons for this are not entirely clear.”
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), the committee’s ranking member, said on X that he met with Candeub before the hearing to discuss merger reviews, Section 230 reform and protecting children online.
