DOJ Will Sue to Block AT&T from Buying Time Warner

This is what fascism is all about, government control of private sector business.

The U.S. Department of Justice is suing to prevent AT&T from completing its proposed $85 billion takeover of Time Warner.

"Our investigation showed this is
an illegal merger that would harm consumers," a DOJ official told reporters.

It should be noted that AT&T failed to agree to sell off CNN and/or fire 20% of its employees, something the Trump administration has desired. CNN, a television network hated by the President, runs an around the clock anti-Trump message.

Reportedly, Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner asked a Time Warner executive earlier this year to get rid of 20% of CNN's staff.

The Wall Street Journal explains how much Trump's DOJ is reaching to block this merger:

The challenge will likely raise novel legal issues, making one of the most ambitious antitrust cases in decades hard to handicap.

In the typical merger case, the government challenges a proposed combination of two companies that directly compete. But the proposed AT&T-Time Warner deal is a so-called vertical merger of complementary businesses: AT&T’s cable, wireless and satellite distribution with Time Warner’s popular content, including its offerings on HBO and Turner networks like CNN, TBS and TNT.

The government at times has raised concerns about vertical deals, but it hasn’t litigated one in decades, meaning a lawsuit against AT&T would require a judge to confront legal issues that courts haven’t faced in recent memory.

“In terms of importance to antitrust, there hasn’t been a vertical merger case in more than 30 years,” said Steven Salop, a professor of economics and law at Georgetown University.

Of course, the Rothbardian view is that there are no free market monopolies and that the only monopolies that exist are those granted exclusive operating privilege by the government.

In other words, there is no monopoly threat by the of Time Warner bt AT&T.

  -RW