Paramount’s lawyers filed a legal response to the states’ antitrust lawsuit against the Warner Bros. Discovery merger on Friday, sketching out arguments and defenses it may use at a trial next March.
\n\nAmong other defenses, Paramount’s lawyers said they may claim that the coalition of 12 states lacks the authority to regulate the merger, “which is vested in the U.S. Department of Justice.”
\n\nParamount also noted that Cinema United, the trade group for theater chains, has called for a settlement.
\n\n“Day by day, the weak case against this Merger gets even weaker,” the company argued, adding that it also plans to challenge the states’ market definitions. “Plaintiffs’ case amounts to a series of attempted shortcuts and assumptions that collapse under scrutiny.”
\n\nCalifornia led the state coalition in suing to block the merger in July, arguing that the deal will create unlawful concentration in the basic cable market and in the wide-release and blockbuster theatrical markets. The DOJ had earlier approved the merger, issuing a memo laying out its reasoning for why the deal should be allowed to go forward.
\n\nStates typically work with the DOJ in antitrust cases, but under the Trump administration California and several others have often charted…
Original source: https://variety.com/v/tv/