U.S. Makes Final Pitch to Seize to Block AT&T’s Time Warner Deal

The U.S. made its final plea within the trial over

AT&T Inc.’s proposed takeover of

Time Warner Inc., telling a mediate that consumers can pay the price if the owner of the country’s ideal pay-TV company beneficial properties control over an array of « must-have » programming bid material.

It’s a « key truth » that the $eighty five billion deal would — for the first time — give AT&T and Time Warner every the inducement and expertise to reduce competitors and dramatically reshape the industry, Justice Division attorney Craig Conrath mentioned Monday in federal court in Washington.

The U.S. doesn’t want to illustrate past an sensible a doubt that the merger will reduce competitors — accurate that it’s doubtless to aid out so, Conrath mentioned in his closing argument earlier than U.S. District Seize Richard Leon. Conrath instructed Leon to make a « predictive judgment. »

Antitrust legal pointers « deal in probabilities, no longer certainties, » Conrath mentioned. « It does that so buyers don’t non-public the dangers. »

Conrath summarized the govts case, quoting industry executives who took the witness stand to criticize the merger. They testified that the deal may perchance perchance make it tougher for distributors to tag programming contracts with Time Warner’s Turner Broadcasting, and that AT&T’s DirecTV may perchance perchance aid by taking in disgruntled subscribers from its competitors.

“It may perchance perchance perchance well let AT&T make its competitors much less aggressive,” Conrath mentioned about the deal.

Legal professionals for AT&T and Time Warner will sum up their case Monday afternoon.