The quiet corridors of the Federal Trade Commission gained an unfamiliar echo on Monday—the sound of a commissioner stepping away not in defeat or controversy, but to take on an entirely different battlefield. Melissa Holyoak, long a familiar figure in Utah’s legal orbit, has been tapped as the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Utah.
Her appointment came directly from the Attorney General, closing her chapter at the FTC the same day it opened a new one in federal prosecution. It’s a swift transition for someone who has already worn many hats—Utah’s solicitor general, Republican commissioner on a sharply divided federal agency, and now the chief federal prosecutor in her home state.
Inside the FTC, her departure stirred reflections rather than farewells. The commission’s chair hailed their years of parallel service, noting the uncommon camaraderie forged between two former solicitors general navigating the FTC’s complex world.
Her exit leaves a vacancy that is already attracting attention. Ryan Baasch—known in policy circles and once part of Texas’s legal apparatus—is expected to be put forward for the commission slot. He would join a panel still adjusting to a reshuffle that saw a new commissioner confirmed earlier this year.
The FTC, bound by rules that limit political imbalance, now sits at a moment of legal suspense. A dramatic dispute over presidential authority to remove commissioners is headed to the nation’s highest court, and the outcome could redraw the boundaries between the White House and independent federal agencies.
For now, Holyoak departs the regulatory stage not with a whisper, but with the weight of a new mandate—one that places her at the center of federal law enforcement in Utah.
