AUGUSTA (AP) – Verizon is backing the U.S. government’s attempt to stop a contempt hearing for the telecommunications giant that’s scheduled for Friday by the Maine Public Utilities Commission.

Federal officials say the hearing could compromise national security.

“The MPUC seeks, under threat of sanction, to compel Verizon to provide information in state proceedings concerning its alleged cooperation with an alleged national security program despite the fact that the United States has specifically instructed Verizon that providing such a response would violate federal law,” lawyers for Verizon wrote in a legal brief.

U.S. District Judge John Woodcock is expected to hear arguments in Bangor today.

A multi-customer complaint filed with the PUC last May effectively seeks to force Verizon to say whether it provided telephone call records to the government without a warrant.

The complaint followed reports about domestic surveillance by the National Security Agency.

The PUC has challenged the adequacy of Verizon responses to date.

On Tuesday, the Justice Department asked Woodcock to bar the PUC from going ahead with a contempt hearing at this time.

The Justice Department also asked the judge to block Verizon from responding to PUC demands for an affirmation of previous statements “because of the substantial risk of direct or inadvertent disclosure of information that would tend to confirm or deny the existence of foreign intelligence activities.”

Verizon supports the federal government’s request for a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction.

“The MPUC’s action unfairly puts Verizon squarely in the middle of this dispute between the United States and Maine over the state’s authority to investigate, and potentially interfere with, an alleged federal national security program,” lawyers for Verizon said.

The federal government’s position drew new criticism Wednesday from the Maine Civil Liberties Union.

“It is the PUC’s job to ensure that all of Maine’s utilities companies are acting within the law,” Zachary Heiden, a staff attorney for the Maine Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement.

“The Department of Justice has no business trying to keep Maine’s PUC from simply doing its job.”

“The contempt hearings on Friday are simply meant to find out why Verizon ignored an order from the PUC,” Heiden said. “There is nothing secret at issue here.”

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