elizabeth warren

Six months later, Trump Mobile still hasn’t delivered preordered phones

“Trump Mobile began accepting $100 deposits from consumers as early as August 2025 but has failed to deliver any T1 phones to consumers… Instead, Trump Mobile has consistently pushed back its delivery date, originally promising August 2025 and subsequently postponing to November and then the beginning of December. As of January 2026, no phone has been delivered,” the letter said.

Trump Mobile customer service reps “provided contradictory and irrelevant explanations for delays, including blaming a government shutdown that had no apparent connection to the product’s manufacturing or delivery,” the letter continued. With the Trump phone still missing in action, “Trump Mobile has been selling refurbished iPhones, which are largely manufactured in China, and Samsung devices, which are manufactured by a Korean company, while claiming these products are ‘brought to life right here in the USA.’”

Trump phone coming in Q1, allegedly

After Trump Mobile failed to deliver the phone in 2025, USA Today asked for a new projected delivery date. “A Trump Mobile customer service representative told USA Today that the phone is to be released ‘the first quarter of this year’ and that it is completing the final stages of regulatory testing for the cellular device,” USA Today reported on Tuesday.

The Warren letter said Trump Mobile’s made-in-the-USA claims “are potentially misleading characterizations for devices that are manufactured overseas,” and that failing to meet promised delivery dates after collecting $100 deposits may be “a deceptive or unfair business practice.” The letter urged Ferguson to have the FTC carry out “its statutory obligation to enforce consumer protection laws.”

The letter pointed out that the FTC has previously acted against companies that acted similarly to Trump Mobile. “The FTC is responsible for ensuring that companies like Trump Mobile do not make false or misleading claims when marketing products… The FTC has previously taken action against companies for false ‘Made in the USA’ claims, misleading representations about product features and origins, bait-and-switch tactics involving deposits for products never delivered, and failure to honor promised delivery dates,” the letter said.

The letter asked Ferguson to state whether the FTC has opened an investigation into Trump Mobile and, if not, to “explain the legal and factual basis for declining to investigate these apparent violations.”

Elizabeth Warren calls for crackdown on Internet “monopoly” you’ve never heard of

anti monopoly, elizabeth warren, monopolies, Policy, syndication / Rejus Almole / November 23, 2024

US Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Congressman Jerry Nadler of New York have called on government bodies to investigate what they allege is the “predatory pricing” of .com web addresses, the Internet’s prime real estate.

In a letter delivered today to the Department of Justice and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, a branch of the Department of Commerce that advises the president, the two Democrats accuse VeriSign, the company that administers the .com top-level domain, of abusing its market dominance to overcharge customers.

In 2018, under the Donald Trump administration, the NTIA modified the terms on how much VeriSign could charge for .com domains. The company has since hiked prices by 30 percent, the letter claims, though its service remains identical and could allegedly be provided far more cheaply by others.

“VeriSign is exploiting its monopoly power to charge millions of users excessive prices for registering a .com top-level domain,” the letter claims. “VeriSign hasn’t changed or improved its services; it has simply raised prices because it holds a government-ensured monopoly.”

“We intend to respond to senator Warren and representative Nadler’s letter, which repeats inaccuracies and misleading statements that have been aggressively promoted by a small, self-interested group of domain-name investors for years,” said Verisign spokesperson David McGuire in a statement to WIRED. “We look forward to correcting the record and working with policymakers toward real solutions that benefit internet users.”

In an August blog post entitled “Setting the Record Straight,” the company claimed that discourse around its management of .com had been “distorted by factual inaccuracies, a misunderstanding of core technical concepts, and misinterpretations regarding pricing, competition, and market dynamics in the domain name industry.”

In the same blog post, the company argues that it is not operating a monopoly because there are 1,200 generic top-level domains operated by other entities, including .org, .shop, .ai, and .uk.

Though far from a household name, VeriSign takes in about $1.5 billion in revenue each year for servicing its particular section of the Internet’s inscrutable plumbing.

In their letter, Warren and Nadler allege that VeriSign has exploited its exclusive right to charge for highly sought-after .com addresses to juice its revenues and drive up its share price—all at the expense of customers for whom there is no viable alternative.

Elizabeth Warren calls for crackdown on Internet “monopoly” you’ve never heard of Read More »