Several months ago, when state attorneys general were building a case against the Paramount–Warner Bros. Discovery merger, I met with an attorney involved in the case to inquire about the legal arguments. I also asked about the timeline, knowing that the deal gets more expensive for Paramount starting in October.

“If we sue,” the source said, “the deal will be delayed through the end of the year.”

That’s a real possibility now that Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín has granted a temporary restraining order (TRO) putting the deal on hold for two weeks. More importantly, the judge scheduled a preliminary injunction hearing for August 3.

That date “could be delayed if the parties agree,” Variety’s Gene Maddaus wrote. But the hearing is critical because, “in antitrust cases, the injunction is often the whole ballgame. If it is not granted, the deal is allowed to close and it becomes almost impossible to unwind later on. But if it is granted, the deal tends to fall apart before the underlying case can go to trial.”

The lawsuit and its timing are of particular interest to CNN journalists, some of whom have serious concerns about Paramount’s ownership and have told me they hope the deal is delayed until after the midterm elections. (The theory being that if Democrats win control of the House, the political environment will change, and Paramount will feel less pressure to align itself with the Trump administration.)

Of course, in a newsroom as big as CNN, there are a wide variety of views about corporate ownership. But one widely held view is that this current, protracted period of uncertainty is bad for business — making it harder to maintain morale, harder to recruit new employees, harder to plan for the future.

During that source meeting I mentioned up top, the attorney involved in the case was quite confident that the state AGs would win an injunction, thereby extending the uncertainty into 2027.

Then again, I quoted an executive involved in the deal last week who was equally confident that “the deal will get done one way or another.”

Martínez-Olguín’s ruling granting the TRO contained some praise for the state AGs’ arguments and some criticism for Paramount’s counterarguments.

It’s probably a mistake to read too much into the judge’s words, since the threshold for granting a TRO is relatively low, and it just stops things temporarily. The threshold for granting an injunction is significantly higher.

But the lawyers for both sides are definitely reading her words closely, so let’s do the same. Martínez-Olguín ruled that the states “make a strong showing that the transaction will substantially lessen competition in the wide-release theatrical distribution market.”

In fact, she granted the TRO based on that one market alone. The lawsuit alleges harms in three different markets.

“What might be ominous” for Paramount, California AG Rob Bonta told Politico, “is that they lost on just one market analysis — not even on the other two that are more compelling, from my perspective. The market concentration data shows a bigger market concentration and a bigger anti-competitive impact for those other two markets.”

Martínez-Olguín also said she “cannot accept defendants’ argument that the transaction will produce efficiencies in the streaming market.” That means Paramount can’t rebut the states’ claims about alleged harm to the theatrical market by pointing over to streaming.

The judge set a speedy schedule for an injunction hearing, which is what Paramount wants, since WBD becomes much more expensive to buy starting in October.

The legal battle over Nexstar’s takeover of rival TV station owner Tegna was similarly swift. A judge granted a TRO on March 27; the injunction hearing was on April 7; and the injunction was granted on April 17. Nexstar and Tegna are now frozen in place, with a trial slated for July 2027.

If you’re thinking, “That’s a really long time from now,” it is — and that helps explain why companies sometimes abandon merger plans altogether when a judge grants a preliminary injunction.

Today’s New York Post headline about the TRO ruling is an ode to the Warner-owned Looney Tunes: “THAT’S STALL FOLKS!”

On NPR’s “Morning Edition,” Michel Martin asked me if Paramount executives are worried right now. I said, well, they’re definitely frustrated, even though the TRO was expected.

The WSJ’s Joe Flint senses the same: “Among Paramount executives, there is unease and frustration over a potentially drawn-out closing process,” he wrote in today’s paper.

Paramount said in a statement that it is looking forward to the injunction hearing: “We are confident the evidence will demonstrate that the State AGs’ antitrust arguments are without merit as their alleged markets and claims of anticompetitive effects are without any basis in modern market realities.”

In addition to the subpoenas demanding testimony about anonymous sources, the Justice Department also issued subpoenas “to third-party phone service providers seeking several journalists’ phone and text messaging records,” the NYT’s Michael Grynbaum reports.

The pursuit of phone records — to see which numbers the reporters were calling and texting — was revealed yesterday when a judge agreed to unseal the NYT’s letter/motion seeking to quash the subpoenas.

The DOJ also targeted phones “used by one journalist’s mother and two journalists’ spouses,” according to the NYT’s letter.

And two of the phone record subpoenas wanted call logs all the way back to January 1. “That time frame strongly suggests that the department is using this investigation not to focus on any purported concerns arising from the July 8 and 9 articles, but instead to forage for information about the journalists’ source relationships more broadly,” the NYT lawyers wrote.

This case has been shrouded in secrecy. But in the past few hours, I’m told, Judge Arun Subramanian has unsealed several other filings, so more information will be coming out today. And a key hearing is slated for Thursday afternoon.

>> Also important to note: The NYT lawyers “also asserted that the Justice Department violated its own policies for subpoenas to news organizations when it waited a week to notify the Times about the phone record subpoenas,” Jacob Rosen wrote for CBS News.

Yesterday’s Reliable Sources lead focused on the Pentagon’s efforts to control information and avoid questions about the war in Iran. After publishing, the Pentagon public affairs office responded to my request for comment.

Chief spokesman Sean Parnell said the US government “has consistently provided comprehensive, real-time updates” on the strikes in Iran. He said, “President Trump and Secretary Hegseth have been constantly providing updates directly to the media and the American people online, delivering clear, unfiltered insight into our objectives and decisive actions.”

Then Parnell criticized the press corps: “Additionally, questions from Fake News reporters do very little to inform the public at all. Their primary goal is to get clips that can be used online to promote themselves and push their preferred narrative.”

A few observations about that. First, Parnell is disputing a foundational idea about the fourth estate, the idea that reporters ask questions on behalf of the public. Second, military reporters feel a real duty to inform Americans; they’re not in it for the clips. Third, it sounds like Parnell is not planning another press briefing anytime soon.

But what the group Military Reporters & Editors said last year still stands: “The Pentagon press corps has been vital to the public’s understanding of its military and military families.”

ESPN is conducting layoffs today, mostly at NFL Network, which was acquired by the sports network earlier this year.

“While most of the job impacts are tied to the acquisition, we will also notify colleagues in other parts of the company today that their positions have been impacted,” ESPN chair Jimmy Pitaro wrote in a memo to colleagues.

Unfortunately, some of the names of those “impacted” — including longtime “SportsCenter” host Karl Ravech — leaked out before the employees were officially told, making a bad situation even worse. The Athletic’s Andrew Marchand has the latest here…

Ben Wikler, the former chair of Wisconsin’s Democratic Party, is out today with “This Is The Plan: How to End America’s Meltdown and Save Democracy.” He pitched the book pretty well on “The Daily Show” last night.

>> Also hitting bookstores today: NYT reporter Mike McIntire’s “Ricochet: Guns, Greed, and the American Way of Violence” and Harvard lecturer DJ DiDonna’s “Big Time Off: The Transformative Power of Sabbaticals and How to Take One.”