US President-elect Donald Trump has picked Gail Slater, an antitrust veteran and economic adviser for JD Vance, to lead the Department of Justice's antitrust division and take charge of a full docket of significant monopoly cases against companies including Google, Visa and Apple.
Ms Slater is expected to continue the department's crackdown on Big Tech, including cases brought during Mr Trump's first term in the White House, Mr Trump wrote in a post on his social media platform.
"Big Tech has run wild for years, stifling competition in our most innovative sector and, as we all know, using its market power to crack down on the rights of so many Americans, as well as those of Little Tech!" Mr Trump said.
Ms Slater grew up in Dublin and is an alumna of the UCD School of Law.
She began her law career in London at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, which brought her to Washington.
Ms Slater served on the White House's National Economic Council in 2018, where she worked on Mr Trump's executive order on national security concerns over Chinese telecommunications equipment.
Before joining Mr Vance's office, Ms Slater worked at Fox Corp and Roku.
Mr Vance, the US Vice President-elect, has said antitrust officials should take a broader approach to antitrust enforcement, and praised the work of Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan.
Ms Slater spent 10 years at the FTC, first as an antitrust attorney where she brought cases to block mergers including Whole Foods' acquisition of organic grocer Wild Oats, and later as an adviser to then-commissioner Julie Brill, who later became an executive at Microsoft.
She also represented Big Tech companies including Amazon.com and Google at a now-defunct trade groupc alled the Internet Association.
Ms Slater is still viewed as an antitrust hawk among Washington tech skeptics, who welcomed her appointment.
Garrett Ventry, a former adviser to Republicans in Congress and founder of GRV Strategies, said Ms Slater's nomination shows Mr Trump is "serious about taking on Big Tech".
"Antitrust enforcement is here to stay," Mr Ventry said.
Ms Slater will take over a number of high-profile cases in which some of the world's largest companies are accused of illegally building and protecting monopolies.
Mr Trump said Ms Slater will "ensure that our competition laws are enforced, both vigorously and fairly, with clear rules that facilitate, rather than stifle, the ingenuity of our greatest companies".
Pete Hegseth pushes ahead amid doubts
Mr Trump's pick to lead the Department of Defense, Pete Hegseth, has pushed ahead with his bid for the job amid doubts in Congress over allegations about his personal and professional life.
Two sources familiar with internal deliberations by Mr Trump's team said the Republican has been considering Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for the defense secretary role should Mr Hegseth falter.
A third source confirmed that Mr Trump and Mr De Santis had spoken about the Pentagon and that Mr DeSantis was considering it.
Mr Hegseth was scheduled to meet with Republican senators whose support he would need to secure the job running the sprawling US military, a jump for a former Fox News host and former National Guard officer.
"I'm doing this for the warfighters, not the warmongers," Mr Hegseth wrote on X. "Our warriors never back down, & neither will I."
He is not the first of Mr Trump's Cabinet picks to run into difficulties.
Former congressman Matt Gaetz dropped his bid for attorney general last month in the face of questions among Senate republicans about alleged sexual misconduct with a17-year-old girl and drug use.
Mr Gaetz has denied wrongdoing.
Mr Trump's pick to head the Drug Enforcement Administration, Chad Chronister, dropped his bid yesterday after pushback from some Republicans for the Florida sheriff's actions during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Mr Trump said on social media of Mr Chronister that: "He didn't pull out. I pulled him out."
US Senator John Thune, who will lead the party's 53 - 47 majority next year, told reporters he would meet Mr Hegseth, as would other Senate republicans.
"He's going to have an opportunity to address all the questions that have been raised, and there are some hard questions being raised. So he'll have to answer those," Mr Thune said.
Mr Hegseth was also set to meet with Republican Senator Joni Ernst, a military veteran and sexual assault survivor.
That talk is seen as key to his prospects, according to a person familiar with the process.
Mr Hegseth has another meeting scheduled with Republican Senator Roger Wicker, who is in line to chair the Armed Services Committee next year.
A wave of media reports have raised questions about Mr Hegseth.
Mr Hegseth has denied allegations made in a police report that he sexually assaulted a woman in 2017 at a conference in California.
The woman said that while drinking with colleagues, she may have been drugged and was then sexually assaulted by a man she later identified as Mr Hegseth, according to the report.
No charges were filed, and he entered into a private settlement with the alleged victim.
NBC News cited ten current and former Fox employees in a report that Mr Hegseth's drinking of alcohol concerned co-workers at the television network, including showing up at work smelling of alcohol and talking about being hungover.
'Outlandish'
The New York Times last month reported on an email Mr Hegseth’s mother wrote to him in 2018 in which she accused him of mistreating women, including lying, cheating, sleeping around and using women for "his own power and ego".
Mr Hegseth’s mother told the Times in an interview that she had sent Mr Hegseth an immediate follow-up email at the time apologising for what she had written and that she "disavows the sentiments she had expressed in the initial email about his character and treatment of women."
On Sunday, the New Yorker, citing documents and accounts of former colleagues, reported that Mr Hegseth was forced to step down by both of the two non-profit advocacy groups he ran after "serious allegations of financial mismanagement, sexual impropriety, and personal misconduct".
The article states that Mr Hegseth’s lawyer declined to comment on the claims, which he described as "outlandish."
Mr Hegseth did not respond to a request for comment sent through the Trump transition office, and the transition team did not respond to a request for comment.
A representative for Mr DeSantis also did not respond to a request for comment.
One top Trump ally, Republican US Senator Lindsey Graham, yesterday called the allegations against Mr Hegseth "very disturbing."
One Trump insider told Reuters that Mr Trump could also turn to Representative Mike Waltz, his choice for White House national security adviser, to head the Pentagon.
CNN, citing unnamed sources, said Ms Ernst could also be in the running for the job.
