{"id":23764,"date":"2026-08-01T01:29:31","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T20:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=23764"},"modified":"2026-08-01T01:29:31","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T20:29:31","slug":"paramount-wants-november-antitrust-trial-as-states-seek-april-2027","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=23764","title":{"rendered":"Paramount Wants November Antitrust Trial as States Seek April 2027"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tParamount Skydance asked a judge on Friday to schedule its upcoming antitrust trial in November, while a coalition of states and the Writers Guild of America asked for a date in April 2027.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThe scheduling matters a lot to Paramount, which will begin paying Warner Bros. shareholders $7 million a day on Sept. 30 until the deal is complete. In the filing, Paramount argued that a delay also \u201cprejudices the creative industry, the individuals who work within it, and the consumers who benefit from it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThe 12-state coalition, including California and New York, filed suit on July 13, alleging that the $111 billion merger of Paramount and Warner Bros. will unlawfully reduce competition in the basic cable and theatrical distribution markets. The Writers Guild of America filed a separate suit the next day, arguing that it will also harm the marketplace for writers. Paramount has argued that the deal will help consumers by providing a more robust competitor to streaming giants like Netflix and Amazon Prime.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tIn the joint filing on Friday, the states asked Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin to schedule a 12-15 day trial starting on April 5, 2027. The Writers Guild of America concurred with the states\u2019 scheduling request.  Paramount wants a 12-day trial beginning on Nov. 4, arguing that any postponement prolongs an uncertain environment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t\u201cDeciding what projects to commit to, and when, is already difficult for creative professionals trying<br \/>to find the right opportunities in a dynamic industry; doing so in an atmosphere of intense business<br \/>uncertainty is even harder,\u201d the company\u2019s lawyers argued. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThe states, meanwhile, are seeking additional time to obtain documents and take depositions from Paramount executives. The trial will be held in federal court in Oakland, and will depend heavily on expert testimony from economists.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tIn the filing, the states argued that Paramount\u2019s proposed scheduled is rushed and unworkable.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t\u201cDefendants\u2019 proposed schedule would deprive Plaintiff States and the Court of a thorough evidentiary record,\u201d the states argued, saying it would allow for less than two months of fact discovery and one month of expert discovery. \u201cTheir extraordinarily truncated schedule unfairly favors Defendants because they (1) have information Plaintiff States need to prove their case and (2) do not bear the burden of persuasion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tParamount faces a deadline to close the deal by June 4, 2027. The WGA argued that such a self-imposed deadline should not dictate the trial schedule.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tMartinez-Olguin granted a temporary restraining order earlier this month that blocked the deal from closing for 28 days. The states were expected to file for a preliminary injunction last week, but in a surprise move, Paramount agreed to put the deal on hold until trial, essentially conceding that an injunction was imminent.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThe state case has presented an unexpected obstacle to the deal, which received approval from the Department of Justice in June. The European Commission and regulators in Australia, China, and many other countries have also signed off on the merger.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Paramount Skydance asked a judge on Friday to schedule its upcoming antitrust trial in November, while a coalition of states and the Writers Guild of America asked for a date in April 2027. The scheduling matters a lot to Paramount, which will begin paying Warner Bros. shareholders $7 million a day on Sept. 30 until&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/Paramount-Warner-Bros-Studio-Merger-Water-Towers.jpg?w=1000&h=562&crop=1","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23764\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}