Media giants Netflix and Paramount are making their sales pitches to take over Warner Brothers Discovery, and it’s caught the attention of Capitol Hill.

Back in December, Netflix announced it had reached a deal to acquire WBD for approximately $82.7 billion, or $27.75 per WBD share. But then Paramount launched a hostile takeover bid for the company at $108.4 billion, or $30 per share.

Last week, executives from Netflix and Warner Brothers Discovery were grilled by senators about the impact a merger could have on consumer pricing and the industry as a whole. 

“When there’s corporate consolidation, two negative things happen: number one, you have less competition, meaning that consumer prices often go up and choice for consumers goes down. And secondly, you tend to see consolidation leading to job losses,” said Rep. Laura Friedman, D-Calif., who represents Burbank, where WBD is located.

“This is something that’s concerning in terms of our local economy in California, but also concerning for what it means for consumers. If you have less choices of streamers, less competition — does that mean that they can now charge higher prices for you to stream? Is there less content for you to watch?”

In a letter sent after that hearing, Friedman and Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., demanded answers from Netflix and Paramount regarding the acquisition, writing that “the outcome of this acquisition will help shape the future direction of one of America’s signature industries.”

Friedman and Schiff want executives to explain how their company plans to ensure that Hollywood and California remain central to their production and investment strategy, how they plan to preserve and expand good-paying film and television jobs in Los Angeles, and if they will commit to good faith bargaining with unions to name a few priorities.

The television and film industry generates $115 billion in regional economic activity each year, but Friedman said more than 40,000 jobs in the industry have been lost in California over the last several years.

The pain of those job losses, she added, extends far beyond that.

“These companies aren’t just impactful to the people they directly employ. They also have an impact on the dry cleaners, on the restaurants, on the coffee shops, on the schools, everything else,” Friedman explained. “These are thousands and thousands of local jobs at a time when we’re recovering from an awful natural disaster. So it’s just another hit to Los Angeles that we can’t afford.”

While Friedman said she and Schiff are still waiting for an official response to their letter, they have heard from representatives from Netflix and Paramount that they do plan to respond to the inquiry. They gave the companies a deadline of this Sunday to reply.

“Consumers across the country are going to be impacted, whether they know it or not,” Friedman warned. “My job as a member of Congress is to watch out for consumers. I want to make sure that if people are going to stream, that they can afford to do so, and that we don’t have a monopoly where the prices are completely out of control.”

Friedman, who is a freshman in the House, has also been advocating for a federal film tax credit similar to the one her home state of California has to encourage production within the U.S.

“That is incredibly important to the United States, so much so that President Trump — someone who I disagree with on almost everything — I agree with him, and he has tweeted several times about how important this industry is for us identity and U.S. security, and that we can’t that we should not be allowing this industry to leave the U.S.,” Friedman said. “We’ve lost those jobs, we’ve lost those productions, we’ve lost control of one of our signature industries. And if we have a national film tax credit, we level the playing field.”

Friedman said she has not spoken with the White House on this issue, but the president’s own ambassadors to Hollywood, John Voight and Sylvester Stallone, have supported the idea. She said she believes Republican colleagues also see the importance of creating such a tax credit, since films are shot all over the country. 

“I’m happy to say that we’ve had really productive bipartisan conversations about having a national film tax credit,” Friedman said. “It’s one of my top priorities here in Congress, and I’m not going to stop until we get this done.”