Attorney General Raoul secures win In challenge to Albertsons, Kroger merger

The Illinois Attorney General's office played a factor in failed grocery merger.

Attorney General Kwame Raoul this week announced the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon granted a preliminary injunction in Raoul’s lawsuit challenging the proposed merger between Albertsons and Kroger. The ruling halts the merger of the largest supermarket chains in the country, including two of the Chicago area’s major grocery chains, Jewel-Osco and Mariano’s, pending an administrative trial before the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

“Today’s ruling is a victory for consumers in Illinois and across the country,” Raoul said. “Reduced competition would lead to higher grocery prices for families at a time when too many can least afford it. I will continue to advocate for consumers to have increased choices that allow them to make decisions that best meet their needs.”

Raoul, along with the FTC and a bipartisan coalition of eight other attorneys general, filed a lawsuit in February challenging the proposed supermarket merger, arguing it would present a significant risk of reduced competition and higher food prices nationwide.

In their lawsuit, Raoul and the coalition argued that businesses facing less competition have the ability to charge higher prices without providing improvements to the quality of goods. Anticompetitive supermarket mergers can impose other harms, including a reduction in labor market competition, which may lower wages or slow wage growth; worsened benefits or working conditions; or result in other degradations of workplace quality.

In November 2022, Raoul and the attorneys general of California and the District of Columbia filed a lawsuit against Albertsons and Kroger to stop a nearly $4 billion payout to Albertsons’ shareholders, which represented a payout 57 times greater than the dividends Albertsons has historically provided.