DOJ’s Apple Antitrust Lawsuit ‘Misguided,’ Says Legal Expert

The department ignores a 2004 Supreme Court ruling in its pursuit of a company operating within long-established market rules, the antitrust expert said.

Attorney General Merrick Garland in Washington, on March 21, 2024. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images) Zachary Stieber

The Department of Justice’s new antitrust lawsuit, United States v. Apple, which Attorney General Merrick Garland announced at a press conference last week, is an aggressive move that may well result in the breakup of the tech firm that an ambitious youngster named Steve Jobs co-founded in April 1976.

But the lawsuit relies on a novel interpretation of antitrust law that shunts aside the longstanding distinction between monopolization and product differentiation.