Mediacom filed an antitrust lawsuit against Sinclair in October 2006, claiming that the group insisted on blanket carriage of 22 Sinclair-owned/managed stations across Mediacom-operated service areas where Sinclair operates a television station regardless of market differences. The District Court for the Southern District of Iowa denied Mediacom's injunction motion on October 24; the cable provider filed an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, but dropped the request on December 13. Sinclair's retransmission agreement with Mediacom was originally set to expire on December 1, 2006, but the group later extended the deadline to January 5, 2007. Despite the extension, the two sides remained at an impasse over how much money Mediacom should pay Sinclair for carriage of its stations. On January 4, the Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau denied Mediacom's complaint, stating that Sinclair failed to negotiate with Mediacom in good faith. After failing to respond to Mediacom's offer to take the dispute to binding arbitration before the deadline, Sinclair pulled all 22 stations from Mediacom's lineups shortly after midnight on January 6.