Ellison Reportedly Said Trump Team He’d Change CNN if He Bought Warner Bros.
Reports from the Wall Street Journal say David Ellison has been talking with people close to President Donald Trump about what he might do with CNN if he ever gained control of Warner Bros. Discovery.
According to the Journal, Ellison suggested he would take the network in a different direction, and those comments reached Trump’s team at a time when Trump has been calling for new leadership at CNN.
The Journal says Ellison’s comments came while Paramount was trying to take over Warner Bros. Discovery in a hostile bid worth around $108 billion.
The bid reportedly had support from Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner. Paramount started the push soon after losing to Netflix in a separate effort to buy Warner, which owns CNN, HBO, HGTV, and other major entertainment brands.
People familiar with the situation told the Journal that Larry Ellison, David’s father and a longtime Trump ally, reached out to Trump after hearing that Netflix’s offer for Warner would likely be accepted.
Larry Ellison warned Trump that the Netflix deal could weaken competition. Soon after, Trump voiced similar concerns during an event in Washington. When asked about the possible Netflix merger, he said it would lead to a “big market share” and added it “could be a problem.” He did not mention that Kushner had a financial interest in Paramount’s rival bid.
David Ellison spoke publicly about the issue on CNBC. He argued that Netflix merging with a large competitor would make the market less fair, saying, “I’m incredibly grateful for the relationship that I have with the president, and I also believe he believes in competition. And when you fundamentally look at the marketplace, allowing the number one streaming service to combine with the number three streaming service is anti-competitive.”
Ellison also said that adding CNN to Paramount would help the company grow and give it a stronger media presence. He explained his vision by saying, “We want to build a scaled, new service that is basically, fundamentally in the trust business, that is in the truth business, and that speaks to the 70 percent of Americans that are in the middle, and we believe that by doing so, that is for us, kind of doing well while doing good.”
When asked whether Trump liked the idea of him owning CNN, Ellison said he didn’t want to speak for Trump, saying, “We’ve had great conversations with the president about this, but I don’t want to speak for him in any way, shape, or form.”
Trump has been openly angry at CNN in recent months. He has criticized several CNN journalists and attacked the network on social media. He recently targeted CNN host Kaitlan Collins, writing, “Caitlin Collin’s of Fake News CNN, always Stupid and Nasty…” and also complained about “the guy who runs the whole corrupt operation.” In other posts, he attacked reporter Natasha Bertrand and dismissed CNN’s coverage as “sick.”
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