White House Rejects Democratic Request For Docs On AT&T-Time Warner Merger
The White House has declined a request by two House Democrats for documents that could show whether President Donald Trump tried to block AT&T’s $85 billion acquisition of Time Warner.
White House counsel Pat Cipollone said in a letter dated Monday to Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY) and antitrust subcommittee chair, Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI), that the White House would not hand over the records the lawmakers requested.
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“As I have conveyed to the Committee before, we stand ready to work to accommodate all congressional committee requests for information related to a legitimate legislative purpose,” Cipollone wrote in the letter obtained by CNN. “We cannot, however, provide the Committee with protected communications between the President and his most senior advisors that are at the very core of the Executive Branch’s confidentiality interests.”
Chairmen Nadler and Cicilline received this letter from the White House on their request for documents related to DOJ’s involvement in the AT&T merger. Statement to follow shortly. pic.twitter.com/ZJ9s57GqzG
— Cicilline Press Office (@RepCicilline) April 16, 2019
The Democrats requested the documents last month following a New Yorker report saying Trump urged his administration to push the U.S. Justice Department to block the merger.
AT&T finalized its deal to acquire Time Warner in June 2018. The Justice Department lost its appeal to torpedo the agreement in February, when a three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled unanimously that the transaction was not harmful to consumers or competitors.
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