A group of Democrat AGs led by California's Rob Bonta have reached a settlement with Paramount that will allow the big Paramount/Warner Bros. merger to move forward. One of the key elements of that agreement was editorial protection for CNN.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who led the 12-state coalition that sued to block the merger, announced the settlement at a press conference in Los Angeles on Monday.
Paramount and Warner now expect the $110 billion deal to take effect in early October, a source involved in the negotiations told CNN...
In exchange for the states dropping their antitrust lawsuit, Bonta said, Paramount will make various commitments, including to release 30 films per year in theaters and to “establish a news editorial independence board to support CBS News’ and CNN’s continued editorial independence” and “ensure independent, objective, fact-based reporting.”
The backstory here is all about politics as even CNN's account of it now admits.
The merger has been politically fraught in part because Larry is a longtime ally of President Donald Trump and David has cultivated close ties to the Trump White House as he’s pursued opportunities to turn Skydance, his relatively small production company, into a global media giant.
This has really been obvious since the Democrat AGs filed the lawsuit. They claimed it was about protecting competition in Hollywood but even NPR knew it was really about making sure major news outlets maintained a Democrat-friendly editorial stance.
A dozen states, led by California, are suing to block Paramount from buying Warner Bros. Discovery in a Hollywood mega-merger that would unite some of the nation's largest movie studios, television newsrooms, and other entertainment properties.
"The unlawful merger of these two entertainment behemoths would lead to higher prices, lower quality, and less content for film and television, harming movie theaters, basic cable distributors, and ultimately, audiences on every sofa and movie theater seat in the U.S.," California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement announcing the suit, which was filed in federal court in California's Northern District...
The Paramount-Warner deal would give a wealthy family that has taken pains to show its allegiance to President Trump the effective ownership of the companies' competing movie studios, streamers (Paramount+ and HBO Max), sports programming (CBS Sports and Turner Sports) and news divisions (CBS News and CNN) as well as a suite of cable channels, such as Comedy Central, VH1, MTV, TNT, TBS, HGTV and Discovery, among others.
They sued to ensure CNN would stay liberal and it appears they got a guarantee on that so now the merger can continue. Even the NY Times is framing that as the big concession.
After weeks of on-again-off-again negotiations, Paramount and the states agreed to a number of concessions to complete the deal, Mr. Bonta said at a news conference on Monday. The entertainment giant has agreed to establish a board of journalists to ensure the editorial independence of CNN and CBS News and committed to distributing 30 movies in theaters every year. The company also pledged to spend an additional $1.5 billion on film production over the next five years and guaranteed to increase the proportion of those movies that are made in America.
In his remarks, Mr. Bonta praised the terms of the settlement but withheld his approval for Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.
I'd bet the $1.5 billion on film production was something close to what the company was planning to spend anyway. And the plan for 30 films a year in theaters probably wasn't much of a change from what they already planned to do. The real issue is the "board of journalists" to run CNN. Apparently that was a step down from a request that the new company sell off CNN.
The deal would make Mr. Ellison one of the most powerful people in the entertainment industry, backed by the fortune of his father, the billionaire Oracle co-founder, Larry Ellison. The Ellison family’s ties to President Trump — which included a dinner David Ellison hosted this spring “honoring the Trump White House” — have made Democrats and many journalists at CNN wary of the deal.
Paramount stopped short of agreeing to concessions that would alter the fundamental makeup of the combined company, such as selling CNN or one of its movie studios...
William Tong, the Democratic attorney general of Connecticut, said in a statement that the state had “wanted and demanded full divestiture of CNN and CBS News” and was “deeply disappointed that we could not do more.”
No doubt the consent decree includes some agreement about who gets to appoint that new board. We'll find out eventually that everyone appointed is a die-hard progressive who will do their best to push CNN even further to the left. I'm pretty sure we'll have a follow up story on this in a few months and that will be the outcome. There's even an outside group vowing to make sure CBS and CNN don't slide to the right.
Norman Eisen, the leader of a coalition of entertainment and news industry professionals who opposed the deal, said in an interview that his organization, Democracy Defenders, would be establishing a new program as a watchdog for CNN and CBS News, funneling any criticism to the independent editorial board that Paramount has agreed to create.
“We and our partners will be on the case 24/7 to make sure CNN and CBS News and the new board are held accountable,” Mr. Eisen said.
So that's it. The progressive AG's used the threat of shutting down the merger to get the partisan outcome they wanted. Paramount is still facing fees of $7 million per day if it couldn't close the deal by October 1, so the final deal is likely to get wrapped up in the next week. But whatever else happens, CNN will continue to be a left-wing news outlet. Congratulations, I guess.
Editor's Note: The mainstream media continues to gaslight, spin, and lie about President Trump, his administration, and conservatives.
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