Criminal antitrust is the easy part to explain: someone agreed to fix prices or rig bids, and the question is whether the government can prove it. Civil enforcement is harder. The theories are broader, the remedies are negotiated, and the line between a lawful business practice and a violation turns on market facts. This three-part series covers where civil enforcement and litigation are heading and what companies should do about it. Part 1 covers the federal enforcers’ posture. Part 2 covers the theories and the private and state litigation. Part 3 is the preparation list.

The Posture: Open to Deals, Ready for Court

The clearest statement of current policy is a speech by Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stephanie Greco on October 15, 2026, titled “Will We See You in Court?” Her message was two-sided.

First, the Division does not begin with a bias against dealmaking. She said mergers and acquisitions typically create value, and criticized the prior administration for its reluctance to engage in meaningful settlement discussions even when parties were offering fixes. A “myopic focus on litigating cases,” she said, is strategically naive. Settlements deliver relief faster, while conduct continues during years of litigation, and every case carries trial risk.

Second, the Division will go to court. She announced the hiring of a new cohort of senior litigation counsel and used the abandoned TransDigm acquisition of Stellant Systems as an example. After an investigation conducted with the Department of War, a key customer, the Division concluded that the deal would harm competition for components used on Navy destroyers and Air Force fighters. The parties discussed remedies, TransDigm would not resolve the concerns, and in July, as the Division was about to file a complaint, TransDigm abandoned the transaction. Her message to dealmakers: bring us a deal like that and expect the same result.

What the Settlements Look Like

Greco listed the past year’s civil results, and the list shows the shape of current enforcement:

• Meat processing: the Agri Stats resolution (May 2026) ending the exchange of competitively sensitive information among large processors.
• Eggs: a June 2026 resolution ending alleged coordinated manipulation of a benchmark used to price eggs.
• Rental housing: the RealPage consent judgment (November 2025) and later landlord decrees, including a September 2026 proposed decree with Pinnacle Property Management.
• Hospitals: the OhioHealth resolution (June 2026) ending contract terms that restricted insurers.
• Merger divestitures in electricity (Constellation/Calpine), packaged ice, ready-mix concrete, asphalt (with the Tennessee Attorney General), and heavy equipment.

The Division’s budget submission adds more merger decrees: HPE/Juniper, Keysight/Spirent, Safran/Raytheon, and UnitedHealth/Amedisys, the last with the largest divestiture of outpatient healthcare services ever required in a merger challenge and a $1.1 million penalty for a false certification in the merger review. In the Live Nation matter, the parties reportedly settled during the government’s case in chief. Many of these were filed with the complaint, a pattern Greco called the ideal result.

Affordability Is the Organizing Principle

Greco named healthcare, housing, food, and higher education as areas of focus, noting that these account for most of an average household’s budget. The pattern in the list above follows: food (meat, eggs), housing (rent algorithms), healthcare (hospital contracting), and agricultural inputs (the October 2026 expansion of the DOJ-USDA memorandum of understanding, with a parallel FTC-USDA request for comment on agricultural equipment). Companies in those sectors should assume heightened attention to pricing mechanisms, information exchanges, and contract terms.

Merger Review: Faster Lanes, Earlier Remedy Talks

Three procedural developments matter for deal planning:

1. Early remedy discussions. Greco said that in the spirit of transparency, the Division finds it constructive to discuss remedies earlier in an investigation when an identifiable fix exists, rather than waiting for the end of a second request.
2. Expedited second-request track. In July 2026, the Division released an updated model timing agreement with an “Expedited Consideration” option, which a Goodwin summary describes as requiring priority productions certified by a senior compliance official, a leadership meeting within 21 days, and a DOJ decision within 14 days on whether to close, narrow, or proceed. Full compliance remains required if the Division needs more.
3. Candor and consistency. Greco recounted a matter in which executives gave a rationale for a deal that their own documents contradicted. She warned that the Division will find out. The arguments that persuade are antitrust arguments backed by ordinary-course documents and data, not industrial-policy or foreign-investment arguments.

Remedies Under Debate

Settlements are not uncontroversial. The Google ad-tech remedies decision, which Goodwin reports was issued September 2, 2026, imposed behavioral remedies: integration with an open-source bidding standard, publisher data portability, and a prohibition on favoring Google’s tools, with six years of monitoring, and declined the divestiture of Google’s ad exchange that the Division had sought. The search remedies decision of September 2025 took a similar approach. The Division describes both as substantial wins; critics note the absence of structural relief. Appeals continue in the search case. (The Goodwin summary dates the ad-tech remedies decision September 2, while a DOJ press release cited by Greco is dated September 16; confirm the date before citing.)

The same debate surrounds the FTC’s behavioral settlement with Corteva over pesticide loyalty rebates and the FTC’s first Robinson-Patman Act settlement in a generation, with Southern Glazer’s. Both are covered in Part 2.

Leadership and Process Notes

According to Goodwin, the President nominated Adam Candeub to lead the Antitrust Division on July 21, 2026, after the prior head stepped down in February. The Division has been led in the interim by an Acting Assistant Attorney General. For companies, leadership transitions rarely change the case pipeline quickly, but they can affect appetite for litigation.

Takeaways

• Expect an invitation to talk remedies early. Have a fix ready and know your divestiture candidates.
• Align your deal narrative with your documents before the first meeting.
• Do not assume a settlement-friendly agency means a quiet one. Greco’s litigation hiring and the TransDigm outcome are the counterweight.
• If you operate in food, housing, healthcare, agricultural inputs, or higher education, treat your pricing mechanisms and contract terms as a priority review item.