Justice, AT&T trade accusations over CNN sale
The Department of Justice (DOJ) and AT&T traded accusations on Wednesday over whether the company would have to sell off CNN, the cable network frequently feuding with President Trump, as a condition of its merger with Time Warner.
Sources at the Justice Department told The Hill and other news outlets that antitrust officials had rejected an offer from AT&T on Monday to divest in CNN in order to win approval for the $85 billion deal.
The sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that the offer did not alleviate their concerns that the deal could potentially harm the public by giving the new company too much power to deliver only the content it produces through AT&T’s networks.
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, however, flatly denied that his company had ever entertained the idea of selling CNN to win approval of the deal.
“Until now, we’ve never commented on our discussions with the DOJ. But given DOJ’s statement this afternoon, it’s important to set the record straight,” said Stephenson, referring to the anonymous quotations from Justice sources.
“Throughout this process, I have never offered to sell CNN and have no intention of doing so.”
It is highly unusual for details of such offers to emerge in public, and the startling back-and-forth between Stephenson and the Justice Department will raise new questions about whether the deal can be consummated.
It was also impossible not to consider Trump’s ongoing feud with CNN, which is run by a former NBC executive who worked with Trump on “The Apprentice.”
The president frequently rips CNN as “fake news,” and earlier this year tweeted out a video from his 2007 "WrestleMania" appearance that was edited to show Trump beating up someone with the CNN logo imposed on their head.
On the campaign trail last year, Trump vowed to block the deal, but since he took office, most observers predicted that the $85 billion transaction would sail through the regulatory review.
Before Stephenson’s public comments, The New York Times reported that Justice had told AT&T and Time Warner to either sell off CNN’s parent company, Turner Broadcasting, or DirecTV as a condition of approving their proposed merger. AT&T bought DirecTV in 2015 for $48.5 billion.
The Hill's sources said that AT&T only offered to sell off CNN, and not Turner.
The Financial Times was the first to report that Justice had asked Time Warner to spin off CNN.
“It’s all about CNN,” a source told The Financial Times.
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that the Justice Department was weighing a lawsuit to block the deal.
Some Democrats were quick to seize on the latest reports as evidence of political interference by the White House.
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It seems that Trumps DOJ thinks it can prevent the sale of CNN and, in this way suppress the press, this is in violation of the First Amendment.