Since taking office, the Trump administration has canceled or stopped 159 enforcement actions against 166 corporations, according to a report from Public Citizen released Thursday. As a result, at least 18 corporations accused of lawbreaking avoided paying a total of $3.1 billion in penalties for misconduct.
“The Trump administration is canceling accountability for corporate predators that cheat consumers, exploit workers, and illegally abuse their power at home and abroad,” Rick Claypool, a Public Citizen research director and author of the report, said in a statement.
Claypool said the “law enforcement” claims the White House uses as pretext for authoritarian anti-immigrant crackdowns, city occupations, and imperial resource seizures abroad lose all credibility when cast against the lawlessness Trump allows for the pursuit of corporate profits.
Public Citizen’s report found that corporations with close ties to Trump and the administration are benefiting from canceled and frozen enforcement.
More than 30 made donations to fund Trump’s inauguration or White House ballroom. Seventeen have revolving door or insider connections with the administration. Twelve hired lobbyists who are closely allied with the administration. Ten have business relationships with Trump’s private companies. And nine made political contributions backing Trump’s presidential campaign.
Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giant and previous employer of Attorney General Pam Bondi, is the top beneficiary of Trump’s canceled corporate enforcement, with three enforcement actions led by the U.S. Department of Justice, or DOJ, canceled since Trump took office.
But Trump’s canceled and halted enforcement actions aren’t distributed evenly across the government.
One third, 53, of the enforcement actions involved canceled investigations, lawsuits, and other accountability measures at the DOJ. Canceled and frozen cases at the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau make up nearly another third, 45. Other agencies where the Trump administration canceled or halted a disproportionate number of enforcement actions include the SEC, 30, Federal Trade Commission, 11, and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 10.
Consumer protection enforcement has especially suffered under Trump, according to the study. Forty percent of the canceled or frozen enforcement actions, 64, were against corporations for alleged consumer protection violations. Other significant areas of retreat include cryptocurrency enforcement, 22; worker protection, 18; antitrust and competition-related enforcement, 17; and foreign corruption and bribery, 15.
Claypool said since the first day of President Trump’s second term, Public Citizen’s Corporate Enforcement Tracker has monitored federal enforcement actions brought against corporations that Trump inherited from the Biden administration.
These enforcement actions include investigations, enforcement lawsuits, and other accountability measures for alleged lawbreaking by many of the largest and most powerful corporations.
