AT&T's $39 billion bid to buy Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile will face scrutiny from U.S. regulators and oversight lawmakers, who will likely demand concessions to ensure open competition among mobile and Internet carriers.
In Congress, at least four committees are expected to hold oversight hearings, including the U.S. House of Representatives' Energy and Commerce and Judiciary Committees and the same panels in the Senate.
AT&T is the biggest corporate "heavy hitter" and second overall on the list of company and other special-interest campaign giving, according to research by the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP). The company has given $46 million since 1989 and spent $3.6 million in contributions to federal candidates in the 2010 election cycle. It also spent roughly $15 million in lobbying in 2010 alone.
The company, a former monopoly broken up in 1984, has tended to give more to Republicans in the past two decades, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, though the figures go up and down with election cycles.
During the 2008 presidential election, AT&T gave about $201,000 to Republican candidate John McCain and $264,411 to Democratic candidate and eventual President Barack Obama.
The top recipients of AT&T's political action committee (PAC) and/or employee contributions during lawmakers' last election cycle among those in positions of power in Congress, according to the CRP, are:
* Republican House Speaker John Boehner, got $87,000, making the company his biggest donor;
* Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid received about $90,000, making the company his 10th-biggest donor;
* Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, the ranking Republican on the Senate Commerce Committee, got $45,000, her fifth-biggest donor;
* Senator Jay Rockefeller, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, received about $37,000 in contributions, making the company his biggest contributor;
* Representative Lamar Smith, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, received $22,000, making the company his biggest contributor;
* Representative Fred Upton, Republican chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, got $11,000, the lawmaker's 10th-biggest contributor.
Deutsche Telekom's PAC and/or employees also gave to several influential lawmakers from 2009-2010:
* Representative John Conyers, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, got $10,000;
* Upton received $10,000
