Washington, D.C. – The American Economic Liberties Project released the following statement in response to reporting that BuzzFeed will acquire HuffPost in a stock deal with Verizon Media.

“The merger of BuzzFeed and HuffPost so they have more scale in bargaining is one result of Facebook and Google’s control over online advertising,” said Matt Stoller, Director of Research at the American Economic Liberties Project. “The non-stop cascade of acquisitions and layoffs in the newsgathering business is a social emergency. Two thousand out of America’s three thousand counties now have no daily newspaper, but as concerning is the fact that even innovative new media businesses with significant amounts of traffic, such as BuzzFeed and the HuffPost, can’t generate advertising revenue. The incoming Biden administration should accelerate ongoing efforts to break Big Tech’s chokehold over advertising markets. In the meantime, lawmakers should consider Congressman David Cicilline’s bill that would provide news publishers a narrow and temporary authority to collectively negotiate with dominant online platforms.”

To learn more, read Economic Liberties’ “Addressing Facebook and Google’s Harms Through a Regulated Competition Approach” here.

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Economic Liberties works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. AELP believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; foreign trade arrangements support domestic security and democracy; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.