The Senate voted Thursday to confirm antitrust lawyer Mark Meador as the newest member of the Federal Trade Commission, a sign that the administration is further embracing populism and a willingness to challenge the corporate world.

The Senate voted 50-46 to confirm Meador, a Republican who has worked in the private sector and for the federal government on antitrust policy. Meador, who has branded Google a “monopolist” in the past, has shown a willingness to go after Big Tech and isn’t cut from the traditional Wall Street-friendly Republican cloth.

Recommended Stories

• Labor Department touts DOGE’s 'incredible discovery’ of nearly $400 million in fraudulent unemployment payments
• Social Security walks back DOGE’s abandonment of phone services
• GOP tax cuts add $6 trillion to debt and hurt growth without spending cuts, CBO finds

Meador’s confirmation comes after Republican FTC Commissioner Andrew Ferguson replaced former FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan at the agency. Khan drew major ire from Republicans and industry groups who accused her of weaponizing the agency.

Republicans such as President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance have helped usher in a historic shift in the Republican Party toward populism. Trump won the election in part by appealing to blue-collar workers and even union members.

Meador studied at the University of Chicago as an undergrad and got his law degree from the University of Houston. In addition to serving as deputy chief counsel for antitrust and competition policy to Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and as an attorney at the FTC, he has also worked as a trial attorney at the Justice Department’s antitrust division.

Meador sided with the DOJ in its antitrust lawsuit against Google and branded the tech giant a “monopolist” in August when a federal judge ruled the company violated antitrust law related to its search business.

“Today a federal court has finally confirmed what every citizen has intuitively known for years: Google is a monopolist,” Meador said on X.

SENATE CONFIRMS CRYPTO AND FREE MARKET ADVOCATE PAUL ATKINS TO LEAD SEC

Meador has also supported the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation-Ticketmaster, which would force Live Nation to sell Ticketmaster.

Responding to a Wall Street Journal piece about how the Republican Party and “big business” have drifted apart, Meador simply wrote “big is bad” on X.