U.S. opposes AT&T Time Warner bid

WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice is suing to block AT&T’s $85 billion bid for entertainment conglomerate Time Warner, setting the stage for one of the biggest antitrust cases in decades.

The suit is fraught with legal and political risks for both sides. Several Democrats have expressed concern that antitrust officials could be seeking to block the deal because the Trump administration has been highly critical of CNN, which is owned by Time Warner — a charge that the White House and Justice Department have denied.

The suit, which AT&T said was filed by the Justice Department’s antitrust division, seeks to prevent a deal that would combine AT&T — already one of the country’s largest providers of Internet and subscription television — with Time Warner’s enormous library of films, HBO, live TV programming and other content.

“It may be one of the most important antitrust battles of modern times,” said Gene Kimmelman, a former federal antitrust official and the president of Public Knowledge, a consumer advocacy group.

The move by the agency is also unusual because the proposed tie-up would combine two different kinds of companies — a telecom with a media and entertainment firm. Antitrust officials are relatively untested in the courts on opposing mergers of this kind. But skeptics of the deal have argued that if it is approved, AT&T could use its immense power to raise prices on consumers and corporate rivals.

The Justice Department’s legal argument mirrors that of consumer groups who say AT&T could withhold Time Warner’s content from other TV and Internet providers.