Former FTC Chair Lina Khan Urges Democrats to Embrace Mamdani’s Small Business Policies Following His Primary Victory

In a pointed message to her fellow Democrats, former Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan is calling on the party to follow the example set by New York City mayoral primary winner Zohran Mamdani in reconnecting with small business owners—a constituency she argues the Democratic Party has largely abandoned over the past three decades.

Writing in a New York Times op-ed published as her tenure at the FTC comes to an end, Khan praised Mamdani’s grassroots approach during his successful primary campaign, highlighting how the democratic socialist “campaigned on a platform of bringing down costs” and “even did an event with antitrust enforcer Lina Khan.”

Khan, who served as chair of the Federal Trade Commission from 2021 to 2025 and is now an associate professor at Columbia Law School, argues that Democrats have strayed far from their New Deal origins when small businesses formed a core part of the party’s coalition.

A Lost Coalition

According to Khan’s analysis, the Democratic Party’s relationship with small business began deteriorating during the Clinton administration, when the party embraced what she describes as Reagan-era “big is better” antitrust policies. This shift, she contends, fueled industry consolidation and bank mergers that squeezed out smaller competitors and reduced lending opportunities for entrepreneurs.

“From 1980 to 2020, as the share of the economy accounted for by small businesses fell, big business interests began spending heavily in elections, bending the ears of many Democrats and sometimes skewing how they saw the economy,” Khan writes in the op-ed.

The former FTC chair acknowledges that even during the Biden administration’s historically high levels of new business applications, “it wasn’t enough to fully integrate small businesses into the mainstream of the Democratic coalition.”

Mamdani’s Model

Khan points to Mamdani’s campaign strategy as a blueprint for how Democrats can rebuild trust with small business owners. She describes how the progressive candidate made authentic connections by visiting halal carts and bodegas to understand firsthand the challenges facing local entrepreneurs.

This approach, Khan argues, represents “the kind of outreach that teaches policymakers about real problems in our economy and can help build trust and lasting relationships.”

She also highlights Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat from rural Washington State who won in a Trump-supporting district by focusing on how market consolidation hurts farmers and championing “right to repair” policies for small businesses.

The Corporate Squeeze

Drawing from her experience at the FTC, Khan details the systematic ways that corporate consolidation harms small businesses across sectors. She describes how pharmacy benefit managers owned by health care giants “can effectively dictate which drugs [pharmacists] can offer and how much they’ll be reimbursed,” forcing some to close their doors.

Similar dynamics, she writes, affect physicians and veterinarians facing pressure from private equity owners, local grocers battling discriminatory pricing, and tech startups vulnerable to algorithm changes by Big Tech platforms.

During her tenure, Khan’s FTC took several actions aimed at protecting small businesses, including banning noncompete clauses, challenging digital platform fees, and prohibiting gag orders on franchisees. However, many of these initiatives face legal challenges from corporate interests.

Political Opportunity

Khan sees particular opportunity for Democrats in the current political moment, arguing that President Trump’s tariff policies “could destroy many small businesses, which have fewer resources to weather chronic economic uncertainty and may be forced by big businesses to absorb the cost increases.”

In one of her final acts as FTC chair, Khan also wrote to New York Governor Kathy Hochul and legislative leaders urging them to outlaw “unfair and abusive” business practices in anticipation of reduced federal enforcement under the Trump administration.

Beyond Messaging

The former FTC chair emphasizes that winning back small business support will require more than improved messaging or photo opportunities. Instead, she calls for Democrats to “make it crystal clear that fighting for a level playing field is a core value of the Democratic Party — even when it means standing up to big business and corporate abuse.”

Khan’s message comes as Democrats face questions about their political future following electoral setbacks. Her argument suggests that returning to the party’s New Deal roots of championing ordinary Americans against concentrated corporate power could provide both electoral success and policy coherence.

“If Democrats take it up in earnest,” Khan concludes, “it could both make small business part of a winning coalition and deliver an economy that is stronger and fairer. Our party and our country would be better for it.”

The op-ed represents one of Khan’s final public statements as a federal official, as she transitions from her role as one of the Biden administration’s most prominent antitrust enforcers to her academic position at Columbia Law School.