Armstrong Surgical Center (the Surgical Center) wished to establish an ambulatory surgery center in Armstrong County, Pennsylvania. At the time, Armstrong County Memorial Hospital (the Hospital) was the only facility with operating rooms in Armstrong County. The Hospital’s staff physicians performed the vast majority of surgeries in the county. If it had been completed, the Surgical Center’s proposed facility would have provided a variety of outpatient surgical services and would have competed with the Hospital. Pennsylvania law provides that any party wishing to establish a new health care facility must first obtain a Certificate of Need (CON) from Pennsylvania’s Department of Health. The Department reviews CON applications in an extensive proceeding consisting of an investigation, an evaluation of submitted materials, and a public hearing. Interested parties, including health care providers that supply similar services in an area, may submit information to the Department regarding any CON application. After extensive proceedings in which the Department reviewed the Surgical Center’s application for a CON, the Department denied the application. The Surgical Center appealed this decision to a state hearing board, which upheld the Department’s denial of the CON. The Surgical Center later sued the Hospital and its staff physicians for alleged antitrust violations. The plaintiff alleged that the defendants engaged in a conspiracy to deny the Surgical Center an opportunity to compete with the Hospital, that the conspiracy included the making of false statements by the defendants to the Department of Health during the proceedings on the Surgical Center’s application for a CON, that the conspiracy unreasonably restrained trade in violation of Sherman Act § 1, and that the defendants engaged in monopolization in violation of Sherman Act § 2. 

What defenses would potentially be available to the defendants in this antitrust case? Why those defenses? If the defendants made false statements to the Department of Health during the proceedings on the plaintiff’s application for a CON, would those false statements disqualify the defendants from potential entitlement to the defenses you noted?