Live Nation is aggressively challenging the Department of Justice's antitrust lawsuit, seeking to relocate the case to Washington DC while pursuing dismissal of several key allegations.

The entertainment giant, represented by Latham & Watkins and Cravath Swaine & Moore, argues that the US District Court for the District of Columbia should hear the case, as it originally approved the 2010 consent decree governing the Live Nation-Ticketmaster merger.

Live Nation contends that the DOJ's allegations of monopolistic practices directly relate to the effectiveness of the consent decree in protecting competition. The company maintains that the merger has not harmed competition and calls the lawsuit baseless.

The legal battle faces several key developments:

• Judge Arun Subramanian has set a firm trial date for March 2, 2026
• A two-tiered access system has been proposed for case-related documents
• Live Nation seeks to maintain access for key corporate officers, including antitrust expert Dan Wall
• The DOJ opposes full access for Live Nation's in-house legal team to competitor information

The company's filing states: "DOJ and 16 state Plaintiffs contractually agreed that Live Nation and Ticketmaster could merge on prescribed terms... Yet this lawsuit is a naked attempt to vitiate that bargain in a different venue."

Both parties must agree on document access specifics or the court will impose its own solution based on their respective positions.

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