Happy Days Are Here Again?: How The 2024 Presidential Election Results Impact the Live Biz

Originally published Oct. 28

Though live entertainment is an escape from the drone, bombast, tedium and anxiety of our increasingly antagonistic political environment, it is, of course, not immune to political forces.

The 2024 presidential election is unlike few others in American history. The Republican candidate, former President Donald Trump, is trying to return to the White House after a four-year hiatus, something only Grover Cleveland has accomplished. His Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, became her party’s nominee after President Joe Biden bowed out of the campaign in July. 

This unique circumstance means both major party nominees have the advantages — and disadvantages — of incumbency; they have records and any predictions about future performance can be based partially on past results rather than simply on campaign rhetoric.

Among the pressing questions facing the live industry is how a new administration will pursue the Live Nation antitrust case. The conventional wisdom for decades was that Republican administrations take a hands-off, deregulatory approach to business, while Democrats impose stringent regulation with a more interventionist style. That would seem to suggest a second Trump Administration would be less aggressive in its prosecution of Live Nation, but Trump is, of course, not a conventional Republican.

A study in a Dutch law review found that the first Trump Administration undertook the most antitrust actions in nearly 30 years. As for Harris, her campaign has not centered antitrust in the same way as Biden and his AG Merrick Garland have, a stance described as “big is bad” by antitrust lawyers. 

“At bottom, we are another casualty of this Administration’s decision to turn over antitrust enforcement to a populist urge that simply rejects how antitrust law works,” Dan Wall, Live Nation’s Executive Vice President for Corporate and Regulatory Affairs, said when the case was filed. “A central tenet of this worldview is that antitrust should target companies that have grown large enough that in some nebulous way they ‘dominate’ markets—even if they attained their size through success in the marketplace, not practices that harm consumers, which is the actual focus of antitrust laws.”

As California’s AG, Harris did sign on to some antitrust cases and her campaign platform does say “she will direct her Administration to crack down on anti-competitive practices that let big corporations jack up prices and undermine the competition that allows all businesses to thrive while keeping prices low for consumers.”

As a political matter, it may be immaterial. Aiming venom at Live Nation and Ticketmaster is a popular and bipartisan pursuit. AGs for 39 states and the District of Columbia have signed on to the federal suit — Democrats and Republicans from the bluest blue to the rosiest red states.

And as a practical matter, judicial inertia is a powerful force. The case is tentatively set for a trial in the spring of 2026. Discovery and deposition scheduling orders have been issued. A ship that big is hard to turn, let alone stop.

Still, Trump has made clear he intends to use the DOJ to investigate his political opponents and the media, among others, whom he has taken to calling “the enemy from within.” Sen. Mitt Romney repeatedly warns that the former president should be “taken at his word” when he makes those threats. One of the antitrust cases pursued by his DOJ would have blocked AT&T’s purchase of CNN parent WarnerMedia; then-candidate Trump said he wanted to block the merger because of the network’s coverage of him. A federal judge dismissed the case and allowed the merger to proceed.

He’s never said if Live Nation has drawn his ire, but if his feelings are rosy or neutral toward the entertainment giant, his Justice Department may move its focus elsewhere.

Moving on from the elephant (or, in the interest of bipartisanship, the donkey) in the room that is the antitrust case, neither candidate’s policy platforms address the live industry specifically. Harris’s consumer protection plank does speak broadly about “fees,” hinting she’d continue Biden’s crusade against hidden fees, which resulted in Ticketmaster moving to an all-in model for shows at Live Nation venues. For the most part, Trump’s policy proposals, outside of a few headline grabbers, are vague. 

One of his major pushes has been that he’d institute broad tariffs of 20%, 60% on goods from China, 100% on goods from countries that move away from trading in the dollar and 2,000% on vehicles made in Mexico. Trump frames the tariff as a price foreign countries would pay for access to the American market, but in reality tariffs are paid by importers who would pass the cost along. 

The nonpartisan Tax Foundation, which advocates for pro-business policies, found that Trump’s proposal would “hike taxes by another $524 billion annually and shrink GDP by at least 0.8 percent, the capital stock by 0.7 percent, and employment by 684,000 full-time equivalent jobs.”

The live industry, already dealing with higher costs due to post-pandemic inflation, would not be immune to the knock-on effects economists predict from the tariff proposal. Finished goods — everything from stage lighting to trucks — would be far more expensive if purchased from overseas. Even products made in the U.S. — say, a soundboard — that include foreign-manufactured components would be pricier.

Finally, there’s ticketing reform, something neither candidate has discussed as it remains largely a congressional issue. The House of Representatives passed the TICKET Act in May, but advocates including NIVA and the Fix The Tix coalition are pushing for the stronger Fans First Act, which was introduced by Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) in December.

Ticketing reform is backed by everyone from progressive New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to rock-ribbed Trump ally Sen. Marsha Blackburn. That would suggest there’s an opportunity to pass legislation —  yet all meaningful proposals have languished in Congress. But optimism still reigns supreme.

“Thankfully, ticketing reform has been a bipartisan priority this Congress. So, regardless of the political makeup of Congress, we’re expecting that there will be legislative champions on both sides of the aisle that will continue to fight for meaningful protections for ticket buyers, artists, and stages,” NIVA executive director Stephen Parker said.