Kathleen W. Bradish
Vice President and Director of Legal Advocacy
The American Antitrust Institute (AAI) will host its 27th Annual Policy Conference, Competition Policy, Journalism, and “the Promotion of Truth Regarding Public Matters,”[1] on June 4, 2026, at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.
Truthful information is the lifeblood of both a healthy democracy and healthy markets. Journalism is an essential conduit for such information. Yet in the current era of media fragmentation, legacy media consolidation, and polarizing regulatory interventions, journalists face mounting challenges in fulfilling their core mission: uncovering facts and making the truth known.
Legally, protections for the accurate reporting of news are commonly associated with First Amendment rights and the Federal Communications Commission’s public interest mandate. But competition and market structure also shape how information is produced and disseminated by influencing the business of journalism itself. Competition policy therefore is a critical building block in the policy architecture that supports journalism’s societal value.
AAI’s 27th Annual Policy Conference will examine how competition policy can better enable journalists to make truthful information known to the public. Three panels of speakers will offer insights, analysis, and recommendations from a variety of professional and academic disciplines.
The conference will include a gala luncheon featuring the presentation of the 2026 AAI Antitrust Achievement Award and the presentation of the Jerry S. Cohen Award for Antitrust Scholarship.
[1] Associated Press v. United States, 326 U.S. 1, 28 (1945) (Frankfurter, J., concurring).
National Press Club Holeman Lounge
529 14th Street NW, 13th Floor
Washington, DC 20045
This conference was approved by the Pennsylvania Continuing Legal Education Board for 4.5 CLE credit hours. Attendees will be emailed CLE certificate of attendance after the conference.
$225 | Conference Registration
$100 | Government/Academic/Nonprofit
$0 | Media
$0 | Advisory Board/Sponsor/Invited Guest
Randy Stutz, President, American Antitrust Institute
Journalists have unique insights into how market dynamics affect their industry. This panel will examine these insights through first-hand accounts from leaders in the field and analysis from academic experts who study it. Panelists will share their observations on a variety of subjects, including the appropriate goals of journalism and antitrust; current obstacles to achieving those goals; how competitive forces currently shape reporting across new and old media; and the challenges of covering antitrust and economic policy during the current and prior presidential administrations.
Moderator:
David O. Fisher, Senior Counsel, American Antitrust Institute
Panelists:
Franklin Foer, National Correspondent, The Atlantic
Lisa M. George, Associate Professor, Hunter College
Leah Nylen, Antitrust Reporter, Bloomberg News
Matt Pearce, Director of Policy, Rebuild Local News
Although digital platforms have surpassed newspapers and television as the predominant mechanism by which many consume news in the United States, millions of Americans continue to rely heavily on legacy media that operate in highly concentrated markets. This panel will examine competition and consolidation in legacy media markets and its implications for news reporting. Topics will include recent merger activity, including the Tegna/Nexstar and Paramount/Warner Brothers mergers; competitive effects analysis in legacy media markets, including whether readers treat digital platforms (particularly social media) as substitutes; practical challenges facing litigants and enforcers; and the industry’s complex regulatory dynamics.
Moderator:
Kathleen Bradish, Vice President & Director of Legal Advocacy, American Antitrust Institute
Panelists:
Emily Curran, Deputy Attorney General, California Department of Justice
Gene Kimmelman, Senior Fellow, Yale University Tobin Economic Policy Center and Harvard Kennedy School Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government
Amanda Lewis, Partner, Cuneo Gilbert Flannery & LaDuca
Phil Napoli, Director, DeWitt Wallace Center for Media & Democracy, Duke University Sanford School of Public Policy
Jerry S. Cohen Award for Antitrust Scholarship
Alfred E. Kahn Award for Antitrust Achievement
Historically, the federal government has been reluctant to intervene in the editorial judgments of news organizations based on concerns about infringing First Amendment rights. Recent Biden and Trump Administration actions, however, have made viewpoint diversity a focal point of antitrust enforcement and regulatory action. This panel will consider viewpoint diversity through a competition lens. Topics will include whether firms meaningfully compete on this dimension; its place within modern antitrust frameworks, including whether antitrust law has a significant role in ensuring viewpoint competition; its relationship to First Amendment principles; and the coherence of recent federal and state actions and advocacy, including in the Omnicom/Interpublic antitrust settlement, the Paramount/Skydance regulatory proceeding, Children’s Health Defense v. Washington Post et al., Media Matters v. FTC, and more.
Moderator:
Mark Hegedus, General Counsel, American Antitrust Institute
Panelists:
David Lawrence, Former Antitrust Division Policy Director, U.S. Department of Justice
Madhavi Singh, Deputy Director, Thurman Arnold Project, Yale University
Gigi Sohn, Executive Director, American Association of Public Broadband; Senior Fellow and Public Advocate, Benton Institute for Broadband & Society; Distinguished Fellow, Georgetown Law Institute for Technology Law & Policy
Maurice Stucke, Lindsay Young Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Tennessee Winston College of Law
Vice President and Director of Legal Advocacy
Senior Fellow, Yale University Tobin Economic Policy Center and Harvard Kennedy School Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government
Director, DeWitt Wallace Center for Media & Democracy
Executive Director, American Association of Public Broadband; Senior Fellow and Public Advocate, Benton Institute for Broadband & Society; Distinguished Fellow, Georgetown Law Institute for Technology Law & Policy
Lindsay Young Distinguished Professor of Law
Promoting competition that protects consumers, businesses, and society is more important than ever. Through our research, education, and advocacy programs, AAI has been active in focusing public and private competition enforcement priorities and shaping progressive competition policy. The only way for AAI to fulfill its mission is through your support.


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