“The woman leading the surging MAGA antitrust movement”
A new profile of assistant attorney general Gail Slater
To start, let me be the one to remind you that you’re getting this because you’re signed up for the occasional update from Washington D.C.-based journalist Nancy Scola, a circumstance you’re forgiven for not remembering because, well, it’s been a minute. But I’m reaching out because I wanted to share a new story of mine.
For context, for many years in Washington, putting aside a lot of shouting and bill drafts, when it came to tech policy not all that much actually happened. This has changed, particularly inside the federal courthouse along Constitution Avenue where both Google and Meta (as in Facebook) have been on trial in major antitrust lawsuits.
For POLITICO Magazine, I profiled one of the central figures in all this. Gail Slater is a quiet Irish-born lawyer who has been a behind-the-scenes player in Washington and is now the assistant attorney general for antitrust. She is, as we put it in the headline, “The Woman Leading the Surging MAGA Antitrust Movement.” Closing arguments in the Google case, which could end up with the company broken up, are scheduled next week, so it’s an especially good time to read the piece:
It was while reporting out this story backstage at a technology conference here in D.C. that this moment happened:
That’s perhaps a story for another day, though!
I’ve also of late been exploring how AI might fit into a journalist’s workflow, including through excellent trainings with the Online News Association and National Press Club Journalism Institute. I’m just finding my footing, but it truly is remarkable stuff. At the moment I’m experimenting with Perplexity for research and Claude for non-substantive light drafting. As journalists we don’t always do the best job of confronting new technology head-on, so I’m thinking through how we might go about doing that in community.
One other note: this Washingtonian profile of National Security Archive director Tom Blanton is a finalist in the Society of Professional Journalists’ D.C. chapter’s Dateline Awards in the magazine features category. Read it now so you can say you already had.
Thanks, as always, for reading.
-Nancy