Trump’s FTC accepts the merger of Omnicom – with a gift to X

The fully republican Federal Federal Commerce Commission has agreed to approve a merger of ads of $ 13.5 billion if it includes the ban on directing advertising dollars of platforms or publishers based on “political or ideological points of view”. Order, which was reported by The New York Times Earlier this month, would prevent the Omnicom advertising giant from avoiding wholesale platforms like X according to their political views without explicit orientation of its advertiser customers. X Loss of advertisers in 2023 After placing ads next to the pro-Nazi content.

Monday, The agency has published a proposed consent order That it indicates “would solve the antitrust concerns” concerning the acquisition of Omnicom of Group Intepublic, which, according to the United States, in the proposed terms, the third and fourth and the largest company could not direct or reject the expenses of advertisers on a given platform on the basis of political or ideological views of this site. Advertisers who work with Omnicom can always ask the media purchase agency directly to avoid certain publishers based on political points of view.

The FTC generally imposes conditions on companies seeking to merge by consent orders to prevent anti -competitive effects, but this unusual provision deals with a particular complaint of the republicans of the Congress and former “first friend” Elon Musk, whose company X (formerly Twitter) said that advertisers An “illegal boycott” By removing the advertisements of the platform in the wake of reports on the content of the far right and the own promotion of Musk Anti -Semitic plots. The FTC Survey on press media information to encourage advertisers to lower X; The media are important prosecuted Today.

One of the main objectives of Musk was the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (Garm), a voluntary initiative organized by the World Federation of Advertisers who helped companies to avoid advertising against illegal or non-security content. ” dissolved Due to limited resources following the antitrust combination of X.

The FTC mentions Garm in his complaint Against the merger of Omnicom, saying that allowing two large companies to merge could have a similar impact. “With a major major competitor in the media purchase services industry following the acquisition, the remaining competitors have fewer objects to coordinate them advertisements, mutual surveillance and each other and punish each other to take measures that had to collectively,” said complaint.

The Supreme Court has previously protected the right to boycott. But in a statement, Republican President Andrew Ferguson said that the provision would not relate to the rights of advertisers’ advertisements. “The decree is lengthwise to avoid interfering with the free and regular course between marketing companies and their customers,” explains Ferguson. “Omnicom-IPG can choose with whom he does business and follow any legitimate instruction of his customers to find out where and how to advertise. No one will be forced to reveal their brand or their announcements in the premises and among the content they do not wish. ”

The order says, however, that Omnicom cannot maintain any policy which “refuses to treat advertisers according to political or ideological points of view” or “directs the advertising expenses of advertisers based on the political or ideological views of the media publisher”.

The proposed order was approved by Ferguson and Commissioner Melissa Holyoak, Commissioner Mark Meador challenged the issue. President Donald Trump previously attempted to dismiss the two agency democratic commissioners And has not yet nominated new, leaving the agency typically bipartite and five members in the hands of three Republicans.