To the delight of trust-busting progressives, President Biden has tapped two Big Tech critics for key roles in the administration.

Why it matters: Biden’s appointments so far show a sharper turn to the left and a deeper interest in new regulation than some expected.

What’s happening: Biden named Tim Wu as a special assistant to the president for technology and competition policy at the National Economic Council and nominated Lina Khan to be a Democratic commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission.

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What they’re saying: “When it comes to the performance of the antitrust agencies — particularly when it comes to the tech sector — there’s a relatively broad, if not always broadcasted, consensus that they fell down on the job with catastrophic results,” said Sarah Miller, executive director of the American Economic Liberties Project, which urges aggressive antitrust enforcement in tech and other sectors.

• “Tim and Lina demonstrated rare foresight on the threats to fair competition and democracy from dominant tech platforms, are leading scholars on how to leverage policy to address those threats, and have significant experience in public service.”
• Miller said the picks suggest that Biden’s approach to antitrust enforcement will be much different than that of the Obama administration’s, which allowed several Big Tech mergers, including Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram, to go unchallenged.