Four Democrats in Congress have asked the U.S. Justice Department to close the merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, as the deal would be responsible for “erode an iconic American studio”.

In a letter Friday to Atty Gen. Merrick Garland and Assistant Atty. gene

.eral

Jonathan Kanter, the legislators

quoted blasted

“damage” caused by the union of the two media companies last year, which led to the layoffs of thousands of workers in Los Angeles, New York and Atlanta.

Opportunities for Latinos and other artists have been reduced as the merger “raised barriers to entry in the media and entertainment industries,” lawmakers wrote.

Warner Bros. Discovery has wiped out hundreds of millions of dollars in programs in recent months, projects that have employed hundreds of workers. the

studioIt

canceled the $90 million movie “Batgirl” to qualify for tax breaks. The film would feature the first Latina superhero in the DC Comics franchise.

The company also ditched an upbeat HBO Max comedy series with a Latino cast, “Gordita Chronicles,” after only about a month on TV.

Saturday marks the one-year anniversary of AT&T’s $43 billion consolidation of its WarnerMedia with cable programming company Discovery. The transaction created a larger media giant, but left Warner Bros. Discovery also with a debt of more than $50 billion. Since then, the company has struggled to get its massive debt under control and has prioritized cost cutting.

“There have been mass layoffs. Content creators have been hurt in many cases,” Representative Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) said in an interview. “And some consumers are holding on to TV and streaming subscriptions with less content than they did a year ago.”

Castro was joined by Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Representative David Cicilline (DR

.

i

.

) And

representative

Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash

.

) in sending the letter asking the DOJ “to investigate the competitive situation in affected labor and consumer markets following the consumption of this merger, which appears to have enabled Warner Bros. Discovery to engage in potentially anti-competitive practices .”

A spokesperson for Warner Bros. Discovery declined to comment.

Despite criticism from prominent members of Congress, it would be highly unusual for the DOJ to attempt to overturn a merger that has already received regulatory approval.

At the very least, Castro said the DOJ, which is currently investigating how best to modernize and enforce antitrust laws, would not approve the merger with Warner Bros. Discovery should be viewed as an example of why some deals should not be approved.

“It’s not done too often, but there are some actions here that are also somewhat unprecedented,” the Texas legislature said, citing

point at

The controversial decision by Warner Bros. Discovery to jettison “Batgirl” after filming was completed and the project was in post-production.

The decision to kill off the film stunned Hollywood insiders. Dumping a movie after shooting is complete, especially one with such a high profile, is exceedingly rare. The choice not to release a “Batgirl” format film meant that the company incurred significant costs. Warner Bros. Discovery

Executives said privately that the film did not perform well for test audiences.

“For the sake of a tax write-off, because the company is in so much debt as a result of the merger, they canceled it.”

Castro

said. “If it wasn’t for the merger, that movie would have ended up in theaters and on the streaming platforms eventually.”

Earlier this year, DC Studios CEO Peter Safran said that while there were “a lot of incredibly talented people in front of and behind the camera in that movie, but [it] could not be released. He praised Warner Bros. CEO David Zaslav. Other media companies, including Walt Disney Co., have cut thousands of jobs as Wall Street worries about the high costs of launching successful streaming services.

A spokesperson for the Justice Department confirmed on Friday that the ministry had received the letter, but declined to comment further.

In recent years, Castro has emerged as one of the strongest voices for increasing diversity in American media. Following the 2019 mass shooting at a Walmart in El Paso,

Texas,

which killed 23 people and injured dozens more, the San Antonio

C

ongressman took a close look at Hollywood’s portrayal of Latinos because he recognized that people’s attitudes toward others can be shaped by media consumption.

Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David

Leading up to the merger, Zaslav touted to Wall Street that his team would find $3 billion in annual cost savings post-merger.

Last fall, Warner Bros. canceled Television are writers and directors workshop program due to cost cutting. However, the company reversed the move amid protests that it was shutting down one of its few programs

S

who nurtured diverse talent.

Lawmakers also pointed to CNN cuts,

eliminating hundreds of jobs at the cable news network

.

“WBD is trying to maintain its entertainment business at the expense of news and journalism,” the lawmakers wrote.

Warner Bros. Discovery

CEO David Zaslav’s first post-merger move was to shut down the nascent streaming service CNN+. His team also dismantled CNN’s documentary film unit, which had been a major stop for film producers.

The four legislators have spoken out about the Warner Bros.

Discovery

deal for

They led a group of more than 30 lawmakers who raised concerns about the proposed merger in late 2021, four months before the merger was completed.

At the time, the group told Garland and Kanter, who oversees the antitrust division, that the union raises significant antitrust concerns. They question the fate of legendary properties like CNN, HBO and the Warner Bros. film and TV studio.

AT&T and Zaslav have long maintained that the deal was not anti-competitive because Discovery was much smaller than WarnerMedia, and the combination of the two companies did not reduce the number of Hollywood studios because Discovery had not previously had its own film studio. Discovery owned channels like Animal Planet, Investigation Discovery, TLC, Food Network and

the popular ones

HGTV.

“We have been keeping abreast of the results and ramifications of the Warner Bros. Discovery merger and are quite disappointed because many of the things we feared have come to pass,” said Castro.

At least Castro said the DOJ, which is currently reviewing

how antitrust laws can best be modernized and enforced

Would the merger with Warner Bros. Discovery should be seen as an example of why some deals should not be approved.