WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has been battling the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, joined 85 other organizations from a range of industries in a letter to senators pressing them to jettison from the Build Back Better plan sections designed to strengthen the agency.
The groups objected to a plan to give $1 billion to the FTC to focus on privacy, data security, identity theft and related matters and another provision that would allow the agency to demand civil penalties from companies accused of a first violation of rules against unfair or deceptive trade practices.
The organizations, which included the National Restaurant Association, National Retail Federation and American Association of Advertising Agencies, said in a brief letter that the provisions “would create an unprecedented and unjustified broad civil penalty authority.”
The letter was dated Wednesday.
“This would constitute a major policy shift in FTC enforcement authority that would unfairly erode due process and would impose significant new costs on companies acting in good faith when serving consumers,” the groups said in requesting that the provisions be removed from the bill.
U.S. Senate Democrats have struggled to find a path forward on President Joe Biden’s $1.75 trillion domestic investment bill, with West Virginia’s Joe Manchin objecting to parts of the program, a person familiar with the negotiations said.
Senate Democrats hoped to pass the sweeping bill before Christmas.
The Chamber of Commerce also said in a statement that it was kicking off an advertising campaign aimed at the FTC.
The Chamber had previously demanded information from the FTC regarding procedures it found questionable, such as allowing a commissioner to cast ballots before he stepped down for actions announced after he left the commission.
(Reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by Dan Grebler)
