More than 14 months after federal regulators let two major telecommunications mergers close, the federal judge tasked with scrutinizing the settlements has quietly approved the minor divestitures the agencies required.
Judge Emmet Sullivan of the federal district court in Washington, D.C., late Thursday issued an opinion that stated the divestiture orders the Department of Justice required, in both the 2005 merger between Verizon Communications Inc. and MCI Inc. and SBC Communications Inc.’s takeover of AT&T Corp. to form AT&T Inc., were “in the public interest.”
