DISH DBS Corporation and DISH Wireless L.L.C. filed jointly administered Chapter 11 cases on June 30, 2026, in the Southern District of Texas, Houston Division, before Judge Christopher Lopez.Case No. 26-90627 The filing entities sit on either side of DISH Network's business: the DBS Debtors run the satellite television operation, and the DISH Wireless Debtors hold the spectrum and 5G network business built out through the Boost Mobile acquisition. At filing, the combined enterprise reported $8.4 billion in assets, $8.2 billion in annual revenue, and 10,400 employees. The cases were filed as a prepackaged Chapter 11, with a restructuring support agreement already in place, and DISH chose to file in Houston rather than in Colorado, where DISH DBS Corporation is incorporated and headquartered.

Although the case proceeds under a single caption, the DBS Debtors and the DISH Wireless Debtors are, in practice, two separate restructurings sharing a docket. DISH filed a joint prepackaged plan and disclosure statement on the petition date and amended it twice more before August, on July 22 and August 11, each round updating deal terms and eventually adding a separate FCC Trust structure and updated liquidation analyses for the two debtor groups.Dkt. 911, 912 The Restructuring Support Agreement sets an October 28, 2026 outside date for confirmation of the DBS Debtors' plan, a deadline that becomes central to the events of the last two weeks.

Everything described in the rest of this report happened inside a fourteen-day window, beginning with the plan bifurcation on August 27.

The bifurcation traces to an August 19 hearing. According to the Debtors' own account, the court proposed two possible tracks for resolving the case, and the Debtors confirmed they intended to elect the second of those tracks, which their filing refers to as the "merits track."Dkt. 1230 That choice carried a consequence: the Restructuring Support Agreement's October 28 outside date for confirming the DBS Debtors' plan meant the DBS side could not wait for the more contested DISH Wireless disputes to resolve. On August 21, the Debtors told the Ad Hoc Group of DBS Noteholders they intended to split the plans. They circulated a draft bifurcated plan on August 24 and received the Ad Hoc Group's comments on August 27, the same day they filed the statement memorializing the split with the court.

That same hearing also brought the case's other major players into the same room. Debtors' counsel met in person on August 19 with counsel to the Committee and with counsel to Crown Castle, American Tower, and SBA to discuss the disputes described in Sections VI and VII below, before the court issued its ruling on the scheduling tracks.

The same week produced a smaller but telling dispute. On August 18, the DISH Wireless Debtors filed an emergency motion asking the court to authorize a Battery Removal Program at what the motion calls Battery Sites, the former cell tower and network locations where DISH Wireless has rejected its leases. The relief requested was narrow: authority, but not a directive, to enter these abandoned sites and recover and recycle batteries left behind at no cost to the landlord, without triggering an administrative claim for rent or site access, and without any further obligation if a landlord declined to permit entry.Dkt. 1122 Before filing, the Debtors shared a draft with the Committee and with counsel to certain landlords, and briefed Crown Castle, American Tower, and SBA on its terms.

Judge Lopez held a hearing on the motion on August 28 and granted it from the bench. One landlord, Vollers Group, LLC, had filed a response reserving its rights three days earlier, and the order entered the same day as the hearing.Dkt. 1249 The same day, the Committee served its third round of Rule 2004 document requests on the Debtors, predating by a week and a half the filing of the trustee motion described in Section VIII.Dkt. 1253

Lease rejection activity continued at a steady pace over the same two weeks. Omnibus orders entered on August 24 and August 31 authorized rejection of leases identified in dozens of separate rejection notices, pushing the total past the fifty-ninth notice filed on August 28.Dkt. 1251 Twenty-one docket entries in this two-week window touch lease rejection, split between the debtors' own notices and certificates of no objection on one side and landlord objections on the other.

Public Storage joined other landlords' objections to the rejection notices on August 26.Dkt. 1209 Two more landlords, 3959 Foothill Blvd LLC and the pairing of 315 E58 BH LLC and Namdar 315 East 58 LLC, filed limited objections on August 28 and August 30, each reserving rights rather than opposing rejection outright.Dkt. 1250, 1269 The debtors have continued to file supplemental certificates of no objection every few days, each covering another set of leases.

Seven days after announcing the bifurcation, the DBS Debtors delivered on it. On September 4, they filed a modified plan and disclosure statement covering the DBS Debtors alone, along with a proposed order that would conditionally approve the adequacy of the disclosure statement, approve solicitation and voting procedures and the form of ballots, and conditionally waive the requirements that the U.S. Trustee convene a creditors' meeting and that the DBS Debtors file schedules of assets and liabilities, statements of financial affairs, and Rule 2015.3 reports.Dkt. 1345 A companion statement to the court laid out the resulting schedule.Dkt. 1346

The schedule leaves roughly four weeks of runway before the October 28 outside date, and nothing on it is final. The objection deadline has not passed, the plan supplement has not been filed, and confirmation depends on both.

The same September 4 statement describes a different posture for DISH Wireless. Citing the DISH Wireless Debtors' constrained liquidity, the debtors and the Special Committee of the Board of Managers of DISH Wireless L.L.C. decided to defer filing a further modified plan, disclosure statement, and solicitation procedures order, and to pause discovery and briefing on the Committee's standing motion and on Crown Castle's objection to the DWLLC intercompany loan claim.Dkt. 1346 The July monthly operating reports filed three days earlier put a number on that liquidity gap: DISH DBS Corporation disbursed just over $2.01 billion in July, while DISH Wireless disbursed $586,201.Dkt. 1280, 1281

Separately on September 4, three more tower-adjacent parties, TPG Peppertree, TowerCom, and Fengate, joined Crown Castle's motion to designate, recharacterize, disallow, and estimate the DWLLC intercompany loan claim for voting purposes.Dkt. 1335 The same claim is cited in the Committee's motion two days later.

On September 6, 2026, the Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors filed an emergency motion asking the court to appoint a Chapter 11 trustee for the DISH Wireless Debtors' estates under Bankruptcy Code section 1104(a), or, in the alternative, to terminate the DISH Wireless Debtors' exclusive periods under section 1121(d).Dkt. 1361 The motion runs 96 pages with exhibits and is directed solely at the six DISH Wireless Debtor entities; it does not seek relief against DISH DBS Corporation or any of the DBS Debtors.

The Committee argues cause exists under section 1104(a)(1) and, independently, that trustee appointment serves creditors' interests under section 1104(a)(2), pointing to the intercompany loan claim described in Section VII as evidence that the DISH Wireless plan process has been built on a foundation the Committee views as unconfirmable. As an alternative to trustee appointment, the motion asks the court to terminate exclusivity, arguing that the DISH Wireless Debtors have not made good faith progress negotiating with non-insider creditors and that the size and complexity of the case support relief under the multifactor test courts apply to section 1121(d) motions.

The Committee requested emergency consideration, with objections or responses due no later than 9:00 a.m. Central time on September 23, 2026, one day before the DBS Debtors' voting report and confirmation brief are due ahead of the September 29 combined hearing. The Committee's response to the Debtors' September 4 statement, filed the same day as the emergency motion, previews the same dispute over how the DISH Wireless plan timeline should proceed.Dkt. 1362

Of the case's 1,517 total docket entries, 204 were filed in the fourteen days between August 24 and September 6. Notices lead the count, driven heavily by the lease rejection process described in Section V, followed by certificates of service, orders, and claim transfers.

The next three weeks carry deadlines for both tracks of this case. The DBS Debtors are proceeding toward confirmation before their October 28 outside date. The DISH Wireless Debtors are awaiting a ruling on the Committee's trustee motion.

No hearing date has been set yet on the trustee motion itself.