Margrethe Vestager previously held the position of European commissioner Commissioner for competition from November 2014, where she was in charge of regulating commercial activity across the 28 member states and enforcing the EU's rules designed to keep the markets fair. A Danish national, Vestager was minister for economic affairs and the interior as well as political leader of the Social Liberal Party from 2011 to 2014. She was minister for education from 1998 to 2001 and head of secretariat with the Danish Agency for Financial Management and Administrative Affairs from 1997 to 1998. She holds a master of science in economics from the University of Copenhagen.

Her politics are liberal in the classic meaning of the term: free speech, free assembly and free trade -- but she argues that it can only happen if markets are free of undue influence and anti-competitive behaviors.