DOJ

After years of ticketing complaints and frustrations, the trial for the Department of Justice’s antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation is officially underway.

As part of its case, the DOJ has accused Live Nation of requiring artists to use its promotional services when they play a Live Nation-owned venue. Because so many venues are owned by the company, the government claims Live Nation’s alleged practices are anti-competitive.

Jury selection began Monday in a New York federal court and opening statements are expected Tuesday for the complaint first filed in 2024. Since then, the antitrust case against the Beverly Hills-based company has been streamlined — examining whether Live Nation uses illegal anti-competitive practices and whether the company and Ticketmaster should be broken up.

The legal proceeding is expected to last around a month, with Judge Arun Subramanian, who also presided over Sean Combs’ sentencing last year, at the helm.

Live Nation’s presidents Michael Rapino and Joe Berchtold, executives from competing companies like Anschutz Entertainment Group and Irving Azoff, the former Ticketmaster CEO, are expected to testify. Musicians like Ben Lovett of Mumford & Sons and entertainer Kid Rock could also take the stand.

Key claims in the lawsuit

The original lawsuit led by a cadre of interested parties including the federal government, 39 states and the District of Columbia alleged that Live Nation and its subsidiary Ticketmaster have monopolies in various aspects of the live music industry, such as concert promotion, venue operations, artist management and ticketing services.

The lawsuit states that Live Nation manages over 400 artists and controls more than 265 venues in North America. Ticketmaster simultaneously controls around 80% of the primary ticket marketplace and is also increasing its involvement in the resale market.

Many of the large monopoly claims were thrown out during a pretrial hearing with Judge Subramanian last month, including an allegation that Live Nation’s industry power raises ticket prices and harms consumers.

The claim with arguably the greatest potential impact centers on whether Live Nation should own Ticketmaster. The two companies merged in 2010, a move that has frequently been considered controversial. Beyond the ownership of Ticketmaster, the DOJ claims Live Nation forces venues to sign exclusive contracts with Ticketmaster, barring the inclusion of other ticket vendors.

“For over a decade, Ticketmaster and Live Nation have promised reform, but meaningful competition has remained out of reach. The industry now stands at an inflection point: restore a competitive marketplace that supports innovation, or allow the status quo to continue narrowing options for American consumers,” Dustin Brighton of the Coalition for Ticket Fairness said in a statement.

“Yet the very competitors that could check this monopoly and restore balance are routinely boxed out by restrictive practices that limit innovation and reduce consumer options,” Brighton added.

Live Nation did not respond to a request for comment. When the complaint was first filed, the company called the claims “baseless.”

“Calling Ticketmaster a monopoly may be a PR win for the DOJ in the short term, but it will lose in court because it ignores the basic economics of live entertainment,” wrote Live Nation in a previous statement.

Next steps after the trial

If Live Nation loses the trial, the judge will decide how the company should be restructured, which could mean selling Ticketmaster to a competitor. Live Nation maintains the right to appeal such a decision, if it materializes, and take the matter to a higher court.

“If the court finds Live Nation violated the law, monetary penalties and behavioral commitments alone will not be sufficient,” Stephen Parker, executive director of the Independent Venue Association, said in a statement.

“The relief must be proportionate to the harm,” Parker added, “and that means structural separation of primary ticketing, resale ticketing, venue operation, national tours, advertising/sponsorship, and artist management must be seriously considered.”

Beyond the current DOJ trial, Live Nation is also facing a lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission and a handful of class action lawsuits from groups of concertgoers.

Feb. 27 (UPI) — The Justice Department has sued another five states, including three led by Republicans, for their unredacted voter registration lists, amid the Trump administration’s the information ahead of November’s midterms.

The Trump administration has now sued 29 states and the District of Columbia for voter information, heightening Democrats’ concerns that it is seeking to meddle in the elections.

The five states sued Thursday were Utah, Oklahoma, Kentucky, West Virginia and New Jersey. The litigation effort has so far disproportionately targeted Democratic-led states, with Utah, Oklahoma and West Virginia among the few GOP-led states sued for their voter registration lists.

Attorney General Pam Bondi argues she is charged by Congress with authority to request the sensitive election data under the Civil Rights Act of 1960, though courts have ruled against the government in the three cases that have reached decisions: California in mid-January and Michigan and Oregon earlier this month.

Courts that have so far rejected Bondi’s argument found either that she lacks the authority to compel disclosure of the unredacted voter lists, as in Oregon, or the laws she cites do not permit the government to obtain them, as in Michigan. The judge in the California case also ruled her demand “stands to have a chilling effect on American citizens like political minority groups and working-class immigrants” worried about how their information will be used.

“As several courts have already held, the Department of Justice’s request for voters’ personal information, including their driver’s license numbers and Social Security numbers, is baseless,” New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport said in a statement Thursday rejecting the Trump administration’s lawsuit.

“We are committed to protecting the privacy of our state’s residents, and we will defend against this lawsuit in court.”

Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson of Utah said the Justice Department sued her state after federal prosecutors declined Utah’s previous offer to share publicly available lists with them. The Trump administration’s lawsuit was expected, she said.

“Neither state nor federal law entitles the Department of Justice to collect private information on law-abiding American citizens,” she said in a statement. “Utahns can be assured that my office will always follow the Constitution and the law, protect voters’ rights and administer free and fair elections.”

Attorney General Gentner Drummond of GOP-led Oklahoma even responded to the lawsuit by stating that they are willing to “fully cooperate with any lawful requests related to voter fraud.”

“Oklahomans should have confidence that their state remains firmly committed to both election integrity and the protection of personal information,” he said in a statement.

The Trump administration has argued it requires the lists for election integrity purposes, raising concerns from Democrats already concerned about Trump attempting to interfere in the midterm elections as he has repeatedly expressed worries that he will be impeached if his Republican Party loses control of Congress.

Democrats and civil rights organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, Common Cause and the NAACP, have each echoed warnings that the Trump administration wants to use voter registration lists to undermine the upcoming election.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division acknowledged Thursday that many states are choosing to fight them in court, but they will not be dissuaded.

“We will not be deterred, regardless of party affiliation, from carrying out critical election integrity legal duties,” Dhillon said in a statement.

WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice appears to have withheld from disclosure files on disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein related to a claim that President Trump sexually abused a minor, a top Democratic lawmaker said Tuesday.

“Oversight Democrats can confirm that the DOJ appears to have illegally withheld FBI interviews with this survivor who accused President Trump of heinous crimes.” U.S. Rep. Robert Garcia of Long Beach said in a statement. “Oversight Democrats will open a parallel investigation into this.”

Garcia is the top-ranking Democrat on the House committee probing Epstein and how federal law enforcement handled its investigation into sex trafficking accusations against the financier.

Trump has repeatedly said he cut ties with Epstein two decades ago and was not aware of the late financier’s activities. The president has also said he didn’t engage in wrongdoing. Last year, Trump strenuously opposed releasing the Epstein files but then signed legislation forcing their release after it was passed by Congress.

A Justice Department spokeswoman said the file that listed all FBI interviews with the victim was temporarily removed in order to do redactions and put back online on Thursday. The spokeswoman said the department has not deleted any of the files and all documents responsive to the law have been produced unless they fall within a category that justifies being withheld.

The White House pointed to a Justice Department social media post saying “ALL responsive documents have been produced” unless there is a legitimate legal reason for withholding them. Democrats on the House Oversight Committee “should stop misleading the public while manufacturing outrage from their radical anti-Trump base,” the statement added.

A White House spokesperson previously cited the release of documents as evidence of its transparency and support for helping Epstein’s victims.

Sara Guerrero, a spokesperson for Garcia, said the department “has yet to respond as to why these documents are missing, despite the active subpoena from the Oversight Committee that does not allow for withholding these documents. They are not addressing the missing files about the survivor and her allegations.”

Legislation Congress passed last year to force disclosure of the Epstein files permits limited redactions for reasons such as to protect victims or classified information and to avoid jeopardizing ongoing criminal investigations.

“Under the Oversight Committee’s subpoena and the Epstein Files Transparency Act, these records must immediately be shared with Congress and the American public,” Garcia said. “Covering up direct evidence of a potential assault by the President of the United States is the most serious possible crime in this White House cover up.”

Tarabay and Strohm write for Bloomberg News. Steven T. Dennis and Hadriana Lowenkron of Bloomberg contributed to this report.

Feb. 17 (UPI) — Officials for Fulton County, Ga., said in a filing Tuesday that the Department of Justice lied to get a warrant to raid and seize 2020 election materials from the county’s elections office.

The officials say President Donald Trump‘s former campaign attorney, Kurt Olsen, orchestrated the search and seizure by the FBI that happened on Jan. 18 at the Fulton County Elections Hub and Operation Center.

“The affidavit admits that the entire ‘criminal investigation originated from a referral sent by Kurt Olsen,’ but it conceals the fact that multiple courts have sanctioned Olsen for his unsubstantiated, speculative claims about elections,” the officials said in an amended motion filed Tuesday.

County officials want the Justice Department to return seized election ballots, voter rolls, digital ballot images and tabulator tapes that are related to the county’s certification of the 2020 presidential election.

“Instead of alleging probable cause to believe a crime has been committed,” the county officials say the Justice Department’s application “does nothing more than describe the types of human errors that its own sources confirm occur in almost every election — with no wrongdoing whatsoever.”

The FBI did not tell the magistrate judge who approved the search warrant that the claims made against Fulton County election officials already had been investigated and debunked, county officials said in their newest filing.

The federal lawsuit was filed on Sunday in the U.S. District Court of Northern Georgia by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Georgia Coalition for the People’s Agenda, the NAACP and Atlanta and Georgia State Conference branches of the NAACP.

They want to stop the Trump administration from using the voter records to purge voters, improperly disclose information or intimidate or dox voters.

Feb. 15 (UPI) — The Department of Justice said in a letter to Congress that it has released all the files related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The letter, sent to lawmakers on Saturday night, also included the names of more than 300 “politically exposed persons” who are mentioned in the overall Epstein files, which includes former presidents, politicians, business people and artists.

Attorney General Pam Bondi and Deputy Attorney General sent the letter to inform the leaders of the House and Senate judiciary committees — Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Reps. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Jamie Raskin, D-Md. — that it has completed its review and release of the appropriate records related to Epstein.

The six-page letter is meant to confirm that the department has “released all ‘records, documents, communications and investigative materials'” in its possession, and includes lists of categories of records that have been released and withheld, a summary and basis for redactions, and a list of all government officials and politically exposed people in the documents that DOJ has released.

Congress in December passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act to require the Justice Department to release all unclassified records in a searchable and downloadable format.

While its deadline was Dec. 19, the department did not release the records until January, and when it did so, it was in a single release of a database that, while searchable, was not well-organized and or carefully redacted — including with the publication of the names of Epstein’s victims.

Congress has also been permitted to review unredacted versions of the documents.

The letter comes days after Bondi was grilled by members of both parties in a Congressional hearing that included shouting matches between the attorney general and some members of the committee holding the hearing.

Among the several hundred names included in Saturday’s letter are “all persons” whose names appear at least once in the released Epstein documents, Bondi and Blanche wrote.

“Names appear in the files released under the Act in a wide variety of contexts,” they wrote. “For example, some individuals had extensive direct email contact with Epstein or [Ghislaine] Maxwell while other individuals are mentioned only in a portion of a document, including press reporting, that on its face is unrelated to the Epstein and Maxwell matters.”

Among the names are Beyonce, Bill Cosby, Fidel Castro, Bruce Springsteen, Alyssa Milano and Diana Ross, Ben Shapiro and a host of other politicians, artists and business people and their spouses.

The nation faces some tough questions following the unwittingly hilarious performance of U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi when she testified before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday about the Justice Department’s handling of the Epstein files, among other things.

Viewers were left asking themselves if the over-the-top dramatics they witnessed were in fact a midweek “SNL” comedy sketch, with Amy Poehler playing Bondi. But on second thought, no one is better at playing the Entitled Mean Girl than Bondi herself.

Deflecting from questions about the DOJ’s mishandling of the Epstein files, Bondi for nearly five hours interrupted, scoffed and yelled at her bipartisan interrogators. She rolled her eyes at questions that annoyed her (i.e. most of the questions asked by Dems), praised President Trump at the weirdest of times, and hurled personalized insults she’d noted ahead of time in a “burn binder” (more on that later).

U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi appears before the House panel Wednesday as, behind her, survivors of sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein respond to a question from the committee with a show of hands.

(Tom Brenner / Associated Press)

Bondi reserved her most dramatic how dare you! bellows for Democrats but did lash out at a few Republicans. Anyone who pressed her for transparency on the many questionable redactions in the Epstein documents risked a spiteful dressing down, including those who inquired if the DOJ was actively investigating any of the rich and powerful men involved in the disgraced financier’s sex trafficking enterprise.

She called Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) “a washed-up loser lawyer,” referred to Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) as “a failed politician” and accused Jewish House member Becca Balint (D-Vt.), who lost her grandfather in the Holocaust, of being antisemitic.

When Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) asked how many of Epstein’s accomplices she had indicted, rather than tell the truth — which is none — she launched into a non-sequitur talking point about the Dow Jones Industrial Average topping 50,000, the S&P 500 nearing 7,000 and the Nasdaq “smashing records” under President Trump. “You all should be apologizing,” Bondi said. “You sit here and you attack the president. I’m not going to have it. I’m not going to put up with it!”

Poehler is talented, but how does anyone top that performance?

If only the hearing were a comedy skit. The hundreds if not thousands of young women who were victimized by Epstein deserve justice, and the many rich, powerful men involved in his criminal enterprise deserve to be held accountable. Bondi claimed there were “pending investigations” into the case but gave little more detail.

Seated in the audience behind Bondi were survivors and families of late survivors of the sex trafficking ring operated by Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell. The women were recognized, with their permission, at the start of the hearing.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) later addressed the group of women: “To the survivors in the room, if you are willing, please stand.” All of them stood up.

“And if you are willing, please raise your hands if you have still not been able to meet with this Department of Justice.” All of the women raised their hands.

Jayapal then addressed Bondi: “Attorney General Bondi, you apologized to the survivors in your opening statement for what they went through at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein. Will you turn to them now and apologize for what your Department of Justice has put them through with the absolutely unacceptable release of the Epstein files and their information?”

Bondi did not face the survivors, instead replying: “I’m not going to get into the gutter with this woman doing theatrics.”

The committee repeatedly asked about numerous problems they’d found in the DOJ’s redactions of the Epstein files, including redacting the names of his suspected co-conspirators while not redacting the names or photos of some of the victims.

She snapped back at them, reminding the room that her DOJ had released more than 3 million documents, and proclaiming loudly, “Donald Trump is the most transparent president in the nation’s history!”

It was all those other guys who dropped the ball, according to Bondi. Why hadn’t former Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland or President Biden investigated the disgraced financier? Rep. Massie cut her off at the knees.

“This goes over four administrations,” he said. “You don’t have to go back to Biden. Let’s go back to Obama. Let’s go back to George Bush. This cover-up spans decades, and you are responsible for this portion,” he said.

She accused Massie of suffering from “Trump derangement syndrome.”

Many of the personal attacks she launched at House members were prewritten in what’s become known as Bondi’s “burn binder,” a notebook filled with unflattering factoids about her inquisitors (she used a similar binder at a Senate hearing). Bondi referenced the guide with such frequency, Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) joked that he’d like to see her “flip to the Jared Moskowitz section of the binder. I’m interested to see what staff provided on the [opposition research] on me.”

If “SNL” does decide to spin a sketch out of the most unprofessional testimony ever by a U.S. attorney general, how can it ever top the show we just saw?