Report: DOJ Settled Live Nation Case on Trump's Orders After Oval Office Meeting With Rapino

President Donald Trump personally directed a senior Justice Department official to settle the government’s antitrust case against Live Nation Entertainment shortly after meeting with CEO Michael Rapino in the Oval Office, according to new reporting from The Wall Street Journal that provides the most detailed account yet of White House intervention in the case.

“Settle it,” Trump told the DOJ official shortly before the antitrust trial began in March, according to the Journal, which cited people familiar with the events. The directive reportedly followed a February 27 Oval Office meeting at which Trump asked Rapino why Live Nation had not yet reached an agreement with the government.

The account significantly expands on previously reported contacts between Trump, Live Nation and senior Justice Department officials. Trump’s personal push to aides to see the case resolved was reported in March, while a subsequent Live Nation court filing confirmed that Rapino discussed the status of the lawsuit with Trump in February.

Live Nation has maintained that Rapino and Trump did not discuss substantive settlement terms during that conversation. The Journal’s latest reporting does not contradict that specific assertion, but alleges that Trump subsequently issued a direct instruction to DOJ leadership to get the case settled.

TicketNews contacted Live Nation media relations Monday seeking comment on the Journal’s latest reporting and the characterization of Trump’s involvement in the settlement process. No response had been received as of publication.

Oval Office Meeting Preceded Settlement Push

According to the Journal, Trump called Rapino to the White House on February 27 primarily to discuss improving bookings at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. That institution has become a meaningful center of gravity for Trump’s attention, as the President Trump has taken an active role in management and programming and installed close allies to its Board of Directors, including Richard Grennell – who was subsequently elected to Live Nation’s Board of Directors in May of 2025.

During the meeting, however, Trump also asked about the Justice Department lawsuit. Rapino reportedly told the president that Live Nation had been negotiating but did not have a deal and that trial was scheduled to begin the following Monday.

Trump’s instruction to settle the case came after that meeting, the Journal reports.

Negotiations then accelerated as jury selection began March 2. Three days later, Rapino returned to the White House for negotiations in the Roosevelt Room involving then-Attorney General Pam Bondi, White House Counsel David Warrington, acting antitrust chief Omeed Assefi and other officials. Live Nation CFO Joe Berchtold and attorney James “Jamie” McDonald of Sullivan & Cromwell also attended.

Trump briefly appeared during those negotiations and again questioned why the matter had not already been resolved, according to the Journal. A six-page settlement term sheet was signed that afternoon.

Live Nation itself later disclosed much of the institutional framework surrounding those negotiations in a court filing, confirming communications involving the company, DOJ leadership, the Antitrust Division and the White House Counsel’s office. The company also confirmed that the March 5 meeting produced the material terms of the eventual agreement.

What had not previously been established was the Journal’s new allegation that Trump personally ordered DOJ to settle following his earlier conversation with Rapino.

DOJ Lawyers Had Considered Ticketmaster Breakup

The Journal also provides important new detail about how far the Justice Department’s position apparently shifted during the negotiations.

Live Nation first presented a settlement proposal in September 2025 that included limits on exclusive ticketing contracts, expanded access for competing promoters at some amphitheaters and a $280 million fund intended to resolve state damages claims.

DOJ antitrust attorneys viewed that as an opening but initially prepared a counterproposal that would still have required Live Nation to spin off Ticketmaster, according to the Journal.

That language was removed before the government delivered its formal counterproposal in January. The Journal reports that Trent McCotter, then an aide to the deputy attorney general, directed trial attorneys to remove the Ticketmaster divestiture provision while senior DOJ official Stanley Woodward was also closely following the case.

Even without a Ticketmaster breakup, the January proposal was substantially more aggressive than the agreement ultimately reached. According to the Journal, it contemplated requiring Live Nation to open-source its ticketing software and sell or relinquish control of roughly three-quarters of its amphitheaters.

Live Nation subsequently brought Sullivan & Cromwell into the negotiations. The firm also represented Trump in personal legal matters, while McDonald—the attorney who led the firm’s work for Live Nation—was representing Trump in two New York appeals at the time.

The Journal further reports that Trump adviser and personal attorney Boris Epshteyn had taken an interest in resolving the Live Nation case. DOJ officials reportedly were unsure whether Epshteyn was acting on behalf of Trump, Live Nation or both.

McDonald has since become U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He assumed that office July 29 after being appointed by the federal district court following the resignation of Jay Clayton.

The Journal does not report evidence that McDonald’s subsequent appointment was connected to his representation of Live Nation, and the timing alone does not establish such a connection.

Live Nation Defends Settlement as States Push Breakup

Live Nation defended both its lobbying strategy and the substance of the settlement in comments to the Journal.

Executive Vice President Dan Wall said the company went above Antitrust Division officials because it had been unable to secure meetings with them for months, arguing the company was entitled to seek discussions elsewhere. Wall also maintained that critics were comparing the actual agreement with an unrealistic expectation that Live Nation and Ticketmaster would be separated.

The Justice Department similarly defended the agreement to the Journal, arguing that settling provided consumers with immediate competitive benefits while avoiding the risks and delays of continued federal litigation. The White House denied that Trump has used the Justice Department to improperly benefit allies and referred questions about the Live Nation litigation to DOJ.

The outcome looks more consequential in hindsight because most of the state plaintiffs rejected the federal deal and continued trying the case without DOJ.

A jury subsequently found Live Nation and Ticketmaster liable on the antitrust claims presented to it, including findings that Ticketmaster unlawfully maintained monopoly power in primary ticketing markets. A coalition of 34 attorneys general has asked U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian to impose remedies that include forcing Live Nation to divest Ticketmaster and major amphitheaters.

The federal settlement, by contrast, keeps Live Nation and Ticketmaster together while imposing conduct restrictions, changes to certain venue agreements, open-ticketing provisions and caps on some fees.

That settlement has not yet received final judicial approval.

Subramanian is reviewing it under the Tunney Act, which requires the court to determine whether a federal antitrust settlement serves the public interest. Earlier this month, the judge denied a broad request by non-settling states for discovery into how the agreement was reached but did so without prejudice, directing the states to develop narrower and more targeted requests that could be brought back to the court.

The Journal’s reporting does not establish that the settlement involved a quid pro quo or other unlawful arrangement. It does, however, add substantially more detail to the central question already raised by state attorneys general, former DOJ officials and lawmakers: whether the federal government’s assessment of an antitrust case against one of the most powerful companies in live entertainment was altered by political considerations outside the ordinary Antitrust Division process.

And unlike when the first reports of Trump’s involvement emerged in March, the comparison is no longer hypothetical. The Justice Department settled; most states went to trial; and those states won a monopoly verdict that could still result in the Ticketmaster breakup the federal government abandoned.