Groups Petition DOJ to Block Any Liberty-iHeartMedia Deal

Amid reports that the Department of Justice approve the potential acquisition of iHeartMedia by Liberty Media, artist rights and consumer groups have written a letter to the Department of Juctice, along with the U.S. House and Senate Judiciary Committees opposing any deal. The American Economic Liberties Project, the Artist Rights Alliance, the Center for Digital Democracy, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, the Open Markets Institute and Public Citizen claim that with Liberty's current holdings -- SiriusXM, Pandora and major stake in Ticketmaster-LiveNation -- the company has "too much control over the music ecosystem."

The Center for Journalism and Liberty at the Open Markets Institute is also calling on the DOJ to deny any large-scale deal between Liberty and iHeartMedia. It claims that any such deal would harm American journalism by further concentrating power in local radio markets nationwide, reducing the outlets for news as well as artists, and such a deal would threaten local businesses with higher advertising rates.

The trade groups also say that any deal would likely lead to further cutbacks in America's local newsrooms, just as the COVID-19 crisis is leading to large and growing job losses -- at last count, more than 28,000 -- in a news industry already under pressure from the business models of Facebook and Google.

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