For the past six years, antitrust legal giants Beth Wilkinson and Jeffrey Kessler have been locked in a high-profile courtroom battle over whether the NCAA and its member institutions have lived up to the requirements of the Sherman Act.
Wilkinson’s firm, Wilkinson Stekloff, served as lead trial counsel for the association in Alston v. NCAA, the Supreme Court case over education-related benefits for Division I football and basketball players. The firm later represented the NCAA in the consolidated House litigation that settled last year, clearing the way for schools to directly pay players. Kessler, meanwhile, served as co-lead counsel for the athletes in both those cases.
Now the two longtime courtroom rivals are teaming up for the first time in their careers to defend Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion acquisition bid of Warner Bros. Discovery, which faces antitrust challenges from the Writers Guild of America and a coalition of 12 state attorneys general, led by California AG Rob Bonta.
Last week, Wilkinson formally joined Paramount’s defense team, which until now has been helmed by Kessler. According to the New York Times, Wilkinson will spearhead the company’s defense against the states’ litigation.
