The president and the media giant are currently locked in a $20 billion legal battle over a “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris
As the Paramount-Skydance deal remains stuck in regulatory limbo with the FCC, President Donald Trump expressed support Wednesday for the $8 billion takeover by David Ellison.
When asked by reporters on Wednesday whether he sees the agency’s review being resolved soon, Trump replied: “I hope so. Ellison’s great, he’ll do a great job with it.”
The deal, which Paramount executives have said would close in the first half of 2025, recently triggered its first automatic 90-day extension after failing to close by April 7. If the deal is not closed by the time that extension expires in July, it would automatically be pushed another 90 days into October.
After that, if the deal is still not closed, the FCC blocks the merger or one of the parties involved breaches the terms of the agreement, then Skydance and Paramount will have the option of terminating the deal.
The praise for David Ellison comes after he and Trump were recently spotted sitting near each other at a UFC event in Newark, New Jersey held earlier this month.
Trump has also previously spoken amicably about the executive’s father and Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, who recently partnered with the administration on Stargate, a$500 billion AI infrastructure project.
The elder Ellison is providing $6 billion to finance the Skydance merger. Though he was initially set to have a 77.5% controlling stake in Paramount following the deal’s closing, the FCC application was subsequently amended to reflect that David would control 100% of the Ellison family’s voting interest.
Despite the positive remarks for the younger Ellison, Trump is currently locked in a $20 billion legal battle with Paramount and CBS over an Oct. 7 “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris, which he alleges was deceptively edited to make her look good.
Lawyers for Trump and Paramount/CBS are currently in active settlement discussions about the matter, including mediation. The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump recently shot down Paramount’s offer to settle the lawsuit for $15 million, with the president aiming to get at least $25 million and an apology.
“What they did was they interviewed Kamala, her answer was horrendous, I would say election threatening,” he said on Wednesday. “They took the entire answer out, and they took another answer from another question and put it in. And they did that, I understand, a number of times … We caught ’em, and they are very embarrassed by it, and they are working on a settlement now.”
Trump added “they’re all getting fired,” a reference to the departures of former “60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens and former CBS News president Wendy McMahon. The pair, who have both previously expressed their disagreement with reaching a settlement with Trump, said during their departures that they were choosing to leave on their own volition after failure to agree on the path forward with the network.
CBS News has maintained that Trump’s accusations of deceitful editing were false, explaining that the promo shown on “Face the Nation” used a longer section of Harris’ answer. It also turned over the transcript and camera footage from the interview to the FCC as part of the agency’s investigation into allegations of “news distortion.” In a March filing to dismiss the Trump suit, CBS called it “an affront to the First Amendment” and “without basis in law or fact.”
Paramount’s settlement talks come as Disney previously paid $15 million to settle a defamation lawsuit Trump brought against ABC News and star anchor George Stephanopoulos. Meta also paid $25 million to settle Trump’s lawsuit about being kicked off Facebook and Instagram after the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
