News & Events

Litigation Partner John Terzaken was quoted in a Law360 article titled, “DOJ Defends Emissions Deal Probe, But Is It Blowing Smoke?” discussing the rationale offered by the DOJ for its antitrust investigation into carmakers’ emissions deal with California regulators. In the article, John mentions that the DOJ would have to find evidence that the carmakers used negotiations over state emissions standards as an opportunity to discuss issues that have a direct competitive impact in order to make a viable case against them because petitioning activity by private businesses is immunized under federal competition laws. “You'd be assuming that these folks just used the opportunity to have discussions about emissions for the purpose of getting into a smoke-filled room to talk about anti-competitive subjects,” he says. “But that's a far cry from anything we've seen publicly.”

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