The Senate late on January 1 confirmed Joshua D. Wright to serve as an FTC commissioner. The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee issued a statement on January 2, saying that Wright’s nomination, among others, had been discharged from the Committee and confirmed by the Senate.
Wright will replace FTC Commissioner J. Thomas Rosch—a fellow Republican—whose term expired in September. The White House announced the intended nomination on September 10.
The George Mason University (GMU) Law Professor was confirmed despite tough questioning at a Commerce Committee hearing on December 4. Wright, an economist, has written extensively on antitrust law and economics and is a regular contributor to the Truth on the Market blog. Some of those writings raised concerns among committee members that Wright might not be a good fit for the FTC.
Wright added a blog post yesterday, acknowledging the Senate’s confirmation of his nomination and noting that he would be “taking a hiatus from blogging here at TOTM for awhile.”
Wright previously served as the inaugural Scholar in Residence at the FTC Bureau of Competition, from January 2007 to July 2008. Before joining GMU, Wright taught at the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy and clerked for Judge James V. Selna of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. He received a B.A. in Economics at the University of California, San Diego and a J.D. and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he was Managing Editor of the UCLA Law Review. According to Truth on the Market, Wright would be the first J.D./Ph.D. to serve as an FTC Commissioner and only the fourth economist.
