Washington, D.C. — As opening arguments kick off this morning in the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s lawsuit against Meta, which takes aim at the Big Tech giant’s anticompetitive acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp, the American Economic Liberties Project released the following statement.

“Despite Meta and Mark Zuckerberg’s attempts to lobby their way out of accountability, there’s no stopping the nearly five years of bipartisan antitrust momentum to break up the poster child of Big Tech’s harmful dominance,” said Lee Hepner, Senior Legal Counsel at the American Economic Liberties Project. “Meta’s acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp were clearly intended to suppress competition — a fact laid bare by Zuckerberg’s infamous ‘it’s better to buy than compete’ mantra. Instead of competing to improve social media, Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp now operate as one, allowing Meta to abuse its extraordinary power to exploit users and censor content, deploy addictive algorithms, discriminate against publishers and advertisers, and distort democratic elections.”

“The merits of the case are on the FTC’s side,” Lee added, “and we fully expect the FTC to rigorously argue its case to restore competition to the friends and family social media marketplace. Meta has skirted the law to become one of the world’s most powerful corporations, and Zuckerberg one of this country’s most reviled oligarchs. Today, the American people will have their day in court.”

At the heart of the lawsuit is Meta’s deliberate strategy to eliminate competitive threats. Internal documents show that Facebook acquired Instagram because it was easier to buy than compete, especially as users shifted to mobile. The WhatsApp deal, likewise, was driven by fears the messaging app could grow into a rival social platform. Instead of innovating, Meta chose to neutralize its competitors — a textbook violation of the antitrust laws meant to protect consumers and foster competition. Meta has meanwhile argued that it faces rigorous competition from other social media platforms, like LinkedIn (professional networks), TikTok (short-form video entertainment), Twitter (professional and news content) and YouTube (long-form video content). But contemporaneous records reveal that Meta and other social media executives understood that users flock to different platforms for different purposes, and that Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp were specifically designed to operate in a distinct submarket for family and friend connections.

The Federal Trade Commission originally filed its antitrust lawsuit against Facebook (now Meta) in December 2020, arguing that the company used its acquisitions of Instagram in 2012 and WhatsApp in 2014 to illegally maintain its monopoly in the personal social networking market. After an initial dismissal in 2021, the FTC refiled the case with more detailed allegations — and in early 2022, a federal judge allowed it to move forward. Since then, the case has gone through years of legal back and forth, including discovery and summary judgment motions, before clearing a final procedural hurdle in late 2024.

Follow Big Tech on Trial for timely updates on the trial’s proceedings.

Learn more about Facebook and Meta’s abuses here.

Learn more about Economic Liberties here.

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The American Economic Liberties Project works to ensure America’s system of commerce is structured to advance, rather than undermine, economic liberty, fair commerce, and a secure, inclusive democracy. Economic Liberties believes true economic liberty means entrepreneurs and businesses large and small succeed on the merits of their ideas and hard work; commerce empowers consumers, workers, farmers, and engineers instead of subjecting them to discrimination and abuse from financiers and monopolists; foreign trade arrangements support domestic security and democracy; and wealth is broadly distributed to support equitable political power.