FCM demands lawmakers block Blackstone takeover Of fifth-largest U.S. railroad

Reported bid would accelerate private equity’s decades-long attack on working families

Fight Corporate Monopolies on Tuesday called for an immediate moratorium on mergers and acquisitions following reports that Blackstone intends to buy up the nation’s fifth-largest rail freight company.

“Railroads are already cutting shifts for locomotive engineers and operators, in the middle of a global pandemic and economic crisis,” said Morgan Harper, Senior Advisor at Fight Corporate Monopolies. “The last thing workers and consumers need is yet another private-equity raid of a major economic sector. The economy needs a timeout from corporate mergers that consolidate economic power in the hands of the wealthy few. Congress and the White House must begin reasserting their authority under antitrust law to protect working-class families.”

Blackstone, the world’s largest private equity firm, is reportedly planning a takeover bid for Kansas City Southern. The $18 billion railroad is the fifth-largest U.S. firm in the industry and forms a crucial link in supply chains for U.S.-Mexico trade.

Blackstone and its peers have helped drive consolidation in every major economic sector over the past three decades. The resulting evaporation of competitive pressures has benefited wealthy executives and investors, but worsened economic inequality for the hundreds of millions of Americans who work for a living.

Congress should pass the merger moratorium introduced by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) in April, seek investigations of existing monopolies across the U.S. economy, and pressure the Department of Justice to actually use its antitrust authority to break up big-business cartels where they are shown to be harming workers and consumers.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the AJOT editorial board or Fleur de lis Publishing, Inc. and its owners.