Trump's DOJ sued AT&T-Time Warner, set precedent for future media challenges

Question: Could you summarize, "Months into President Donald Trump’s first term in the White House, his Justice Department sent shockwaves through the media industry by suing to block AT&T’s takeover of CNN owner Time Warner. The unusual challenge set off speculation that the lawsuit was driven at least in part by a desire to punish CNN for critical coverage of Trump. Although the lawsuit eventually failed and the deal went through, the damage was done. The Trump administration’s legal challenge cost AT&T precious time in the rapidly evolving media landscape and helped doom the merger. Now, Trump is returning to power at a time when the hobbled media industry appears to be on the cusp of another frenzy of deals. And his administration will have ample opportunities to slow or even kill future transactions – lifeboats that some media companies may need to survive. Case in point: Comcast revealed on Wednesday plans to spin off MSNBC, CNBC and other cable assets into a company that’s separate from the NBC broadcast network. The spinoff itself won’t require approval from the DOJ or the Federal Communications Commission. But it’s widely expected the spinoff company will need to find a dance partner to make it through the world of cord-cutting. That will give Trump-appointed regulators an opportunity to damage a network he’s clashed with for many years. “There are only two media entities that Donald Trump dislikes more than CNN. One is MSNBC and the other is NBC,” Craig Moffett, a media veteran and founder of MoffettNathanson, said in a phone interview. Eyebrows in the media industry raised this week when Brendan Carr, Trump’s nominee to lead the FCC, linked the agency’s review of the Skydance-Paramount deal to a “60 Minutes” interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. Carr told Fox News that the FCC will want to review transcripts from the “60 Minutes” interview as part of its review of Skydance’s proposed deal with CBS owner Paramount. “That speaks volumes. It says that media outlets traditionally described as liberal may have a very hard time doing deals,” said Moffett. Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, founder and president of the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute, told CNN that the opportunity for a “brilliant re-clustering” of media businesses is being clouded by the incoming Trump administration. Sonnenfeld, a contributor to CNBC, suggested that Trump’s “overt vindictiveness” could lead officials to slow-walk deals to hurt their value for “revenge,” even if those deals ultimately prevail in court. Sonnenfeld argued that’s exactly what happened with the AT&T-Time Warner deal. “They slow-walked it. AT&T ultimately won, but it was a pyrrhic victory. They lost a window. It became a bad deal,” he said." into 3 sentences