U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, and frequent merger critic, joined three other lawmakers on Tuesday to urge the Defense Department to thoroughly review defense contractor L3Harris Technologies’ (LHX.N) $4.7 billion deal for Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings (AJRD.N). The Defense Department is influential with the antitrust agencies on approving deals that touch on military issues and often takes too soft an approach, Warren and the other lawmakers wrote.
L3Harris’ purchase would reduce competition in the shrinking defense industry to a new low, Warren and the other lawmakers wrote. Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and Boeing depend on products that only Aerojet can produce, and the company’s acquisition could hamstring their operations.
The letter comes days after the FTC asked for more information about L3Harris’ planned purchase of the last remaining domestic supplier of rocket motors for the Pentagon’s new generation of missiles. If the acquisition goes through, it will give the company a near-monopoly in the domestic production of propulsion systems for both cruise and ballistic missiles, the letter said.
In a separate letter to the FTC, Warren pressed the agency to investigate whether the deal complies with the law. “The recent FTC actions relating to the Aerojet Rocketdyne deal show how important it is for the agency to ensure that the law conducts mergers and acquisitions,” Warren wrote in a letter to Chairwoman Lina Khan and Commissioners Kelly Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya, all Democrats.
According to a Georgetown University study, FTC requests for more information about proposed deals are sometimes a precursor of eventual objections by the agency. Between 2000 and 2020, just 28 percent of deals that received a request for more information were approved as written, the study found.
Senator Warren is a widely respected figure who uses her knowledge of finance and economics to protect consumers, root out corruption, and strengthen America’s democracy. She is known for her original thinking, political courage, and relentless persistence, which led to the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in the wake of the financial crisis and helped save millions of families from financial exploitation.
As a Senate Armed Services Committee member, she is a leading voice on national security and homeland security issues and has pushed for comprehensive overhauls of critical programs. She is also a strong advocate for closing the revolving door between senior national security officials and foreign governments, combating retired military officers working for foreign governments, and addressing conflicts of interest at executive branch agencies. She has also introduced legislation to address these concerns, including the Anticorruption & Public Integrity Act. The bill aims to fundamentally change how Washington does business by establishing an independent anticorruption agency and expanding an independent ethics office insulated from Congressional politics.
