Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino, defending his company, takes star role at antitrust trial

NEW YORK (AP) — The longtime CEO of Live Nation Entertainment was the star witness of an antitrust trial in New York on Thursday, defending the dominant position his company has acquired over the past two decades as a lawyer from nearly three dozen states sought to portray the concert giant as greedy and abusive toward customers.

Michael Rapino, who has led the company since its founding 21 years ago, testified in the case. case The U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Live Nation and its ticketing subsidiary Ticketmaster two years ago.

“I’m very proud,” Rapino said, mentioning that she believes her company took a fragmented industry 20 years ago and organized it to better serve artists and fans in a way that other companies are now trying to emulate. In 2010, Live Nation merged with Ticketmaster.

The federal government last week determined its role in the case and won concessions from Live Nation aimed at increasing competition and ideally lowering ticket prices for concertgoers. Six states joined the federal government in settling. But 33 states and the District of Columbia are pursuing the lawsuit.

Jeffrey Kessler, the attorney representing the states, questioned Rapino throughout the day as she tried to show that the company was crowding out competitors. and increasing prices for fans..

At one point, Kessler brought up a 2022 message in which one of Live Nation’s key ticketing employees wrote to another employee on the company’s private messaging system that some customers were “so stupid” and that he was “bragging about robbing them blind, baby.”

Rapino called the language “disgusting” and “not the way we do business” and said she learned about it last week and plans to “deal with it this week.”

When Kessler pressed whether the employee would be disciplined, Rapino said her company had a tendency to “give employees breaks” and added, “I heard him apologizing.”

Live Nation said the company only learned of the employee’s private messages when they were made public during the lawsuit last week. Their lawyers described the conversation between the two employees, who are personal friends, as “casual banter, not politics.”

Punished employee Benjamin Baker, who is head of ticket sales for Venue Nation, which includes the company’s amphitheatres, called the messages “very immature and unacceptable.” when you testify This week.

Throughout her testimony Thursday, Rapino appeared calm and relaxed as she explained why she believes many of Kessler’s claims are misleading or false.

For example, Kessler confronted him with a statement from a Ticketmaster executive on the company’s opening day. infamously trouble-plagued effort Selling Taylor Swift tickets in 2022, legacy Ticketmaster systems were to blame.

“We thought the demand was overloading the system,” Rapino said. “Turns out that wasn’t true.”

Instead, he said the crime was a cyberattack.

When Kessler suggested that Live Nation had banned customers from bringing their own lawn chairs to its 40 amphitheatres across the country, which could force them to pay extra for the company’s lawn chairs, Rapino pushed back.

“It was a safety issue, of course,” Rapino said, explaining that event audiences became upset with each other because fans brought chairs of various sizes, sometimes obstructing the view of others.

At another point, Kessler brought up the 2024 controversy, in which some fans of singer Adele complained about Ticketmaster’s handling of pre-sale tickets.

However, Rapino explained that the controversy reflected an example of rival ticket companies treating themselves like fan clubs because “we had to get free tickets.”

Kessler asked Rapino if she rejected Live Nation’s offer to pay for tickets to please Adele’s fans.

“We would never say no to Adele,” Rapino said. “We said no to the ticket company.”