Industry at a Crossroads
Living Update: June 15, 2026
New leadership in the Antitrust Division of the DOJ
News at the DOJ…
Stanley Woodward, the Associate Attorney General, has been placed in charge of running the Department of Justice Antitrust Division.
This is important because the division he now controls has spent the better part of the last two decades as the principal federal antitrust threat to organized real estate.
He brings no real estate or MLS background. His career is criminal defense and he is described as an architect of the administration’s restrained enforcement posture. That posture, not any real estate doctrine, is what he carries into the division.
His record on real estate runs through one person, Gail Slater,who served as Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust from March 12, 2025 to February 12, 2026. She was the industry’s principal antagonist at the DOJ. She kept the pressure on after the commission settlements. Woodward is tied directly to her removal, and the removal of her deputies, Roger Alford and William Rinner.
His significance to the real estate industry is that he is the instrument of the leadership change that removed the division’s real estate hawk (Slater), and that his governing philosophy is restraint.
Sources:
- MLex, “US DOJ’s Stanley Woodward to Assume Charge of Antitrust Division,” June 15, 2026.
- U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Associate Attorney General, staff profile, “Stanley E. Woodward, Jr.” (confirmed October 2025; sworn November 14, 2025).
- CBS News, “White House Is Expected to Shake Up More Leadership Roles at Justice Department,” April 4, 2026.
