California and roughly 10 other states are preparing an antitrust lawsuit to block Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, according to Reuters. The lawsuit is expected to be filed in the coming weeks.
California has been leading the effort, with New York among the states also involved. A complaint is being drafted by senior officials across roughly 10 states, who are weighing a potential filing date as early as this month, according to Bloomberg. No final decisions have been made about filing or which states would join.
Beyond California, the states examining the deal include those led by Democratic attorneys general — among them Washington state, Oregon, Nevada, Colorado, Connecticut and New York. The probe has also drawn in Republican attorneys general from Tennessee and Pennsylvania, as well as Massachusetts’s top legal officer, a Democrat.
Among the competitive concerns drawing scrutiny from state investigators is whether combining the two companies would give the merged entity outsized leverage over filmmakers and television producers. California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in May that there are “red flags everywhere.”
“The Paramount acquisition of Warner Brothers remains an active investigation, and we do not have any updates to share at this time,” a spokesperson for Bonta’s office said in a statement.
Paramount pushed back against the anticipated challenge. “Opposing this deal means opposing expanded consumer choice, new opportunities for creators and workers, and greater competition throughout the creative ecosystem — the opposite of what antitrust law is meant to achieve,” a company spokesperson said in a statement. “We will continue to fight against any attempt to derail a deal that plainly benefits consumers, creators, and the industry as a whole.”
The potential state action comes as federal antitrust enforcement has pulled back under the Trump administration. Federal antitrust enforcers have not moved to block a single merger since January 2025, and the prospect of Washington stepping in to challenge the Paramount-Warner transaction looks remote.
Thousands of entertainment industry workers have signed onto opposition efforts against the transaction, which would bring together two of the five biggest Hollywood movie studios, the CNN and CBS news networks, and rival streaming platforms HBO Max and Paramount+, citing concerns about widespread layoffs and diminished consumer options.
Timing pressure is mounting for Paramount. The company filed with the Federal Communications Commission seeking approval for the foreign investments backing the acquisition, including sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Abu Dhabi. Should the transaction remain unclosed come October, Paramount faces daily payments to its shareholders that the company has put at approximately $6.9 million. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026.
Shares of Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount stock both fell on Friday after Reuters reported news of the impending lawsuit.
