California hires Milbank to fight Paramount Warner Bros. Discovery merger

California hired Milbank to help fight Paramount Skydance Corporation’s $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, adding one of the country’s most formidable antitrust firms to a case that is quickly turning into a major test of state power over media consolidation.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta led a coalition of 12 states in filing the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Monday, July 13, 2026. The coalition includes Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Washington, underscoring how widely the states are coordinating to challenge the deal.

The complaint says the transaction would lessen competition in wide-release theatrical distribution, top-grossing theatrical distribution and basic cable licensing. The states argue that those effects would ripple through movie theaters, basic cable distributors and audiences nationwide. California has separately warned that major media deals can increase market concentration, reduce competition, hurt workers in the media industry and limit consumer choice, making the case about more than one corporate merger and more about who controls access to films, channels and streaming-era bargaining power.

The move to bring in Milbank signals how hard-fought the case is expected to become. California said it hired the firm because it anticipates facing a highly resourced defense team from Paramount, and Milbank’s antitrust bench gives the states added firepower in an injunction battle and a high-value corporate dispute. For Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, that means the challenge is no longer just about clearing regulators. It is now a sustained courtroom fight over whether a deal of this scale should be allowed to reshape Hollywood’s studio landscape.

The Department of Justice approved Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery on June 12, 2026, clearing a major federal hurdle and leaving the states as the main legal barrier. Paramount has said the lawsuit distorts antitrust law and misrepresents competition in entertainment, while the state coalition is betting that a post-DOJ challenge can still stop a merger that would concentrate more cultural and economic power in fewer hands.