On August 13, 2025, President Trump issued an executive order revoking former President Biden’s July 9, 2021 Executive Order 14036 “Promoting Competition in the American Economy” (the “Biden Order”).
Comprised of 14 pages of exposition, mission-setting, and agency directives, the Biden Order affirmed that administration’s aim to “enforce the antitrust laws to combat excessive concentration of industry, the abuses of market power, and the harmful effects of monopoly and monopsony—especially as these issues arise in labor markets, agricultural markets, Internet platform industries, healthcare markets (including insurance, hospital, and prescription drug markets), repair markets, and United States markets directly affected by foreign cartel activity[.]” The Biden Order set out a “Whole-of-Government competition Policy” that directed federal agencies, such as the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”), to adopt pro-competitive regulations and rescind regulations that “create unnecessary barriers to entry that stifle competition,” including narrowing or eliminating the scope of enforceable restrictive covenants.
Recent Updates
- No Free Pass in Mass: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Says Irreparable Harm Must Be Proven, Not Presumed, in Trade Secret Cases
- New York Federal Court Enforces Non-Compete Against Employee Terminated for Cause
- Louisiana, Maryland, and Iowa Pass Laws Restricting Noncompetes Specific to Certain Professions
- Delaware Refuses to Blue Pencil Overbroad Restrictive Covenants Following Business Acquisition
- Virginia Senate Bill 128 Adds Health Care Professionals to Virginia’s Noncompete Restrictions