A defiant Randall Stephenson told antitrust enforcers that AT&T Inc. would see them in court after the Justice Department sued to block the company’s $85.4 billion bid to buy Time Warner Inc.
The lawsuit “stretches the very idea of antitrust law beyond the breaking point,” Stephenson, AT&T’s chief executive officer, said at a briefing Monday. He left the door open for negotiations to find a way for the deal to pass federal muster — but reiterated that he wouldn’t sell CNN to appease Washington, whether the deal was influenced by President Donald Trump or not. AT&T’s attorney, Daniel Petrocelli, said the company is prepared to go to trial in as few as 60 days.
It would then be up to a judge to determine whether the combination of AT&T and Time Warner would give the new entity too much power in the fast-changing media landscape, as Makan Delrahim, the new head of the Justice Department’s antitrust division, contends.
If the matter goes to court, AT&T will surely press for a decision before April 22, the date before which the two companies can walk away without penalty, said Jonathan Chaplin, an analyst with New Street Research. “AT&T is certainly willing to fight this.”
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