Top DOJ antitrust enforcer is out weeks before Live Nation trial

Gail Slater, the top antitrust enforcer at the Justice Department, announced Thursday that she has left her post, just weeks before the agency’s next major tech monopoly trial against entertainment giant Live Nation is set to begin.

“It is with great sadness and abiding hope that I leave my role as AAG for Antitrust today,” Slater posted from her personal X account. Slater thanked the staff of the Antitrust Division and called the role “the honor of a lifetime.” In a statement, Attorney General Pam Bondi thanked Slater for her service, but did not directly address questions about what precipitated her departure or who would take over as the acting leader of the Division.

Slater’s nomination to the position shortly after Trump’s election drew bipartisan support, but her time at the Justice Department was marked with internal strife. Last year, two of her top deputies were terminated amid a clash with Bondi’s then-chief of staff Chad Mizelle over lobbyists’ reported role in ushering through approval of a wireless networking merger. The DOJ claimed at the time that Roger Alford and Bill Rinner were fired for “insubordination,” but Alford later spoke out about what he termed “MAGA-in-name-only lobbyists” who he said were enabled by select DOJ officials who have “perverted justice and acted inconsistent with the rule of law.”

More recently, Slater was “sidelined” from negotiations with executives and lobbyists for Live Nation as its March 2nd trial date approaches, Semafor reported. Instead, senior DOJ officials were reportedly communicating with company representatives. An unnamed DOJ spokesperson told Semafor at the time that its report “contains misinformation about an ongoing matter that is confidential, but what can be said is that AAG Slater is very much involved.”