On Jan. 21, 2021, President Biden designated Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, a Commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission since 2018, to serve as the Acting Chair of the FTC. The designation of Slaughter, who has advocated for more aggressive antitrust enforcement by the FTC since joining the Commission, signifies the Administration's increased focus on competition issues and concern with threats to competition. One area where Acting Chairwoman Slaughter seemingly intends to sharply increase the FTC's focus and efforts is in its treatment of vertical merger transactions, identifying the evaluation and enforcement of such transactions as an area where the Commission should break with historical approaches and adopt a more aggressive posture. Acting Chairwoman Slaughter dissented from, and calls for revisions to, the Commission's 2020 Vertical Merger Guidelines, criticizes the way in which the FTC has historically evaluated such transactions and expresses skepticism at the presumption that such transactions are generally procompetitive. In March, the Commission demonstrated its willingness to police such transactions more aggressively, voting 4-0 to challenge the acquisition of Grail, Inc. by Illumina, Inc. Merging parties should take heed and consider any vertical interlocks between them, as well as whether a proposed transaction may lead to any change of incentives that could foster competitive harms.