Want FTC to approve a merger? Just advertise on Trump's Truth Social
The Federal Trade Commission is reviewing a merger between two giant advertising agencies, Omnicom and Interpublic. Normally, this deal would be the sort of thing that wouldn’t generate a ton of attention outside of industry watchers. But we live in the Trump era—where every action by a federal agency is dictated by Donald Trump’s personal and political whims. So now, this merger might come with an absolutely wild and unconstitutional provision: The combined company cannot refuse to place a client’s ads based on media platforms’ political content.
The FTC frames this as preventing the ad agencies from “boycotting” platforms, but that’s stretching the legal definition of “boycott” beyond recognition. Companies are forbidden from colluding with each other to exclude competitors from their market, to fix prices, or to require the use of a particular provider. “Boycott” does not mean a company deciding not to do business with another company, but the FTC really, really wants it to mean that, so it can force advertisers to spend money on Truth Social, X, and whatever other Nazi hellholes pop up online.
The proposed order, already approved by the FTC commissioners, essentially allows the organization to control not just where Omnicom—the name of the merged company—places ads on behalf of companies working with them, but also to control which advertisers they choose to work with. The merged company also could not refuse to work with an advertiser because of their political or ideological viewpoints. So, when Stormfront comes knocking, gotta work with them. Terrific.
The company would also have to agree to file annual reports and additional reports anytime the FTC feels like asking. Then, the FTC will determine whether the company is in compliance. To do that, the FTC gets to demand access to all of Omnicom’s books, ledgers, accounts, correspondence, and anything else that the FTC wants, whenever they want, as long as they give the company five days notice. Oh, and the company has to pay for all copy costs for whatever the FTC wants copied. The FTC can also interview anyone at Omnicom.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/6/24/2329666/-Want-FTC-to-approve-a-merger-Just-advertise-on-Trump-s-Truth-Social
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