AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said Thursday it "makes no sense" to jettison CNN. | Michael Cohen/Getty Images for The New York Times AT&T CEO: 'We’re prepared to litigate now' over Time Warner deal

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said Thursday his company is fully prepared go to court if the Justice Department rejects his company's $85 billion merger with Time Warner.

"We're prepared to litigate now," Stephenson said at a New York Times DealBook conference, saying the company had been preparing for such a possibility since the deal was announced more than a year ago.


“We have been working very diligently on a litigation strategy and a litigation plan," he said, adding the company would go to court if that can produce a "better outcome" than a negotiated settlement.

The AT&T CEO also insisted he had not been asked to dump Time Warner's CNN and repeated he would not do so.

“Irrespective of what you read yesterday, I have never been told that the price of getting the deal done was selling CNN, period," he said. "There is no intention we would ever sell CNN.”

Stephenson said it "makes no sense" to jettison CNN. He framed his interest in buying the network as part of a larger competition with tech companies like Google and Facebook to attract advertisers: “That’s what this is about.”

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Sources familiar with the merger told POLITICO that the DOJ issued an ultimatum to the companies Monday — that they either sell Time Warner's Turner Broadcasting, which includes CNN as well as networks like TBS and TNT, or shed satellite television provider DirecTV.

The sources said it's clear the real sticking point for the government is CNN, whose coverage of the administration has become a frequent target of President Donald Trump's anger.

Unnamed DOJ officials gave a much different account, saying the companies themselves had offered to sell CNN — an option the officials said they rejected. Stephenson has strenuously denied that.

