[pc86]

Do you have any evidence that you can just bribe your way past antitrust regulations (which are enforced by hundreds or maybe even thousands of attorneys across the political spectrum) or is this just how you feel because you don't like who is in the White House right now?

[snark42]

Not anti-trust, but you can apparently bribe the FCC to get a merger through. This just came out today.

https://www.propublica.org/article/paramount-mergers-fcc-ken...

[mschuster91]

> Do you have any evidence that you can just bribe your way past antitrust regulations

Well... we certainly know that preemptive appeasement is a thing [1]. IMHO, this is equivalent to a bribe - a favor, just not in monetary form.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/sep/26/kimmel-controv...

[naet]

I was curious so to get a very rough ballpark figure. So I went to the Wikipedia List of largest mergers and acquisitions article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_mergers_and_ac...)

Added up all the free market enterprise section completed deals where the purchaser was indicated as US based

Obama era:

2009: 6,

2010: 1,

2011: 4,

2012: 1,

2013: 4,

2014: 5,

2015: 7,

2016: 6

Trump term 1:

2017: 4,

2018: 8,

2019: 13,

2020: 7

Biden term:

2021: 4,

2022: 4,

2023: 7,

2024: 4

Trump term 2 so far:

2025: 11*,

2026: 9*

Obama average: 4.25 / year

Biden average: 4.75 / year

Trump term 1 average: 8 / year

*Most of the last two years are indicated as still pending, so not sure if they will go through or not.

Not exactly the most scientific data gathering or study. But it does suggest that large mergers and acquisitions have generally been made more frequently under Trump.

[pc86]

"More business happens under comparatively pro-business Administration" is certainly a revelation.

I don't mean to be snarky but "I counted things on Wikipedia" is not exactly slam dunk proof when the GP was all but saying Trump is selling antitrust immunity on the open market.

[Grombobulous]

It was still non-zero amount of evidence and that’s exactly what was being asked for.

[kortilla]

Evidence of a process being used is not evidence of bribes in a process.

A thing happens in every administration regime where once it becomes clear that X is acceptable (e.g. renewables projects, LBOs, nuclear, oil drilling, etc), there will be a lot of submissions to do X without any bribes at all.

[Grombobulous]

Fair.

I’ll toss in some better evidence then: the Paramount lawsuit settlement that paves the way for the merger, which includes future payments for things like pro-Trump advertisements/PSAs:

https://www.foxnews.com/media/how-trump-sued-cbs-won-60-minu...

Paramount shareholders are suing over this and accusing the administration of bribery.

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/paramount-shareholders-a...

Here’s another giant unrelated article that details the Trump administration’s shakedown system:

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/unco...

I’ll remind everyone that it has been well established fact that Trump was basically the real estate guy for the Russian mafia in NYC before he got into politics. It isn’t some kind of strange coincidence that a lot of what he does feels mafia-like.

[mullingitover]

It’s honestly a howler to imply that this isn’t a deeply corrupt regime that’s openly doing crimes. The burden of proof is frankly on the argument to the contrary at this point.

The president is making a genuine, serious attempt to install his personal attorney to the office of Attorney General and he has a good chance of succeeding. This country is cooked.

[whoopdedo]

Do you have data from 2000 to 2004? Not only covering an earlier Republican administration it also captures the last tech bubble.

[Grombobulous]

I would say “don’t like who is in the White House” is really underselling the situation.

The high level of financial corruption of the current administration is very well documented.

Let’s not forget that the president is a convicted felon, and his felonies were all financial crimes.