{"id":854935,"date":"2026-09-21T02:12:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T02:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/854935\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T02:12:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T02:12:09","slug":"opposition-grows-to-paramount-warner-bros-merger-settlement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/854935\/","title":{"rendered":"Opposition grows to Paramount-Warner Bros. merger settlement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Tensions flared on the eve of a critical week ahead for Paramount Skydance\u2019s proposed $111-billion acquisition<\/a> of Warner Bros. Discovery, amid new urgency for talks aimed at settling antitrust litigation brought by California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta and 11 other states.<\/p>\n

Over the weekend, opposition intensified to a proposed settlement as details trickled out, including a proposal to establish a bipartisan editorial board to monitor cable news channel CNN, one of Warner\u2019s premier properties that Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison would control along with CBS News. <\/p>\n

It was unclear Sunday whether a proposed settlement<\/a> would require Paramount to sell off assets \u2014 something Bonta repeatedly has insisted upon. Critics of the deal urged Bonta and other state attorneys general to resist pressure to reach a settlement that would allow Ellison\u2019s deal to move forward. <\/p>\n

\u201cState Attorneys General, please hang tough against the giant proposed Paramount-Warner Brothers merger,\u201d Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) wrote on social media late Saturday. <\/p>\n

\u201cParamount, run by the Ellisons, should not own both CBS and CNN. California must not cave and take a deal that leaves both under the same owner,\u201d Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) wrote<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Bonta and Ellison have made progress in the talks in recent days<\/a>, according to four people familiar with the matter not authorized to speak publicly. <\/p>\n

However, New York\u2019s Letitia James and at least two other attorneys general who joined Bonta\u2019s lawsuit in July privately have expressed reservations about the proposed compromises, believing they don\u2019t go far enough to mitigate concerns about the power Paramount-Warner Bros. would wield over the film and TV industries should the merger go through, according to the people familiar with the matter. <\/p>\n

Neither James nor Connecticut\u2019s William Tong is on board with Bonta\u2019s proposed settlement, three knowledgeable people said. A potential split within Bonta\u2019s coalition could be a setback because Bonta needs the other state attorneys general who joined his legal effort to sign off on any deal. <\/p>\n

Reached for comment Sunday, a spokesperson for Bonta reiterated a statement from last week.<\/p>\n

\u201cPotential settlement talks are confidential,\u201d the statement said. \u201cWe cannot confirm or deny whether settlement talks are occurring or their alleged substance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paramount maintains its deal to bring HBO, CNN, CBS, TBS, Comedy Central and two legendary film and television studios together would create a stronger company that could withstand the fierce competition from tech giants such as Apple, Netflix, Google (which owns YouTube) and Amazon. The two studios, on their own, would not be strong enough to remain viable in the streaming age, the company has said. <\/p>\n

On Thursday, Paramount lawyers plan to demand that U.S. District Judge Araceli Mart\u00ednez-Olgu\u00edn<\/a> in Oakland require the states and the Writers Guild of America to post a $1.88-billion bond that would cover some of Paramount\u2019s delay-related deal costs should the company eventually prevail.<\/p>\n

The states and the WGA, which also sued to block the merger, have balked at the request, which was designed by Paramount to create fissures within the coalition of states, which also include Minnesota, Oregon, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey and Massachusetts. <\/p>\n

Ellison wants the merger finalized by Oct. 1, when his company will be obligated to make a higher payout to Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders. The company has threatened to move its Hollywood base from its historic Melrose Avenue lot to Tennessee or Texas should the antitrust battle stretch into October.<\/p>\n

The prospective loss of an iconic California business \u2014 a century-old film studio that helped establish Hollywood \u2014 has rattled state and local politicians, who are fearful of losing more jobs at a time when Los Angeles film production levels already are at alarming lows. <\/p>\n

Gov. Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Xavier Becerra, the Democratic nominee for California governor, have publicly called on Bonta to settle the suit rather than prepare for a trial next spring. City Councilmember Nithya Raman, Bass\u2019 opponent in the L.A. mayor race, has been one of few California politicians in support of Bonta\u2019s fight. <\/p>\n

In an opinion essay Sunday, a trio of 1st Amendment and antitrust experts dismissed Paramount\u2019s threat to leave Los Angeles as a ploy that doesn\u2019t make business sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cEllison\u2019s threat is empty, and the AG should call that out \u2014 not give into it,\u201d the experts \u2014 Fiona Scott Morton, Gene Kimmelman and Norm Eisen \u2014 wrote in the Contrarian<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Both Morton, an economics professor at the Yale School of Management, and Kimmelman formerly served in the U.S. Justice Department during Democratic administrations. Eisen, founder of the group Democracy Defenders Action, is helping lead the Block the Merger campaign. <\/p>\n

\u201cParamount [would be] sinking the cost of moving before it knows what businesses it owns and how best to combine and organize them \u2014 which makes expensive strategic mistakes inevitable,\u201d the trio wrote. \u201cA company that raises its own costs while leaving behind the most valuable labor in the industry does not threaten California; it threatens itself.\u201d <\/p>\n

The group noted Paramount, in its regulatory filings, still lists its Times Square offices in New York as its corporate headquarters \u2014 not its Melrose Avenue campus in Hollywood. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere is also the possibility that Ellison is planning to move Paramount to Tennessee regardless of how the lawsuit resolves,\u201d the group wrote.<\/p>\n

Bonta and Paramount have discussed including in any settlement a condition that Paramount would keep its operations in California for a set period, according to people familiar with the proposal but not authorized to comment.<\/p>\n

Merger opponents planned a Sunday evening rally outside Bonta\u2019s offices in Oakland to encourage him to stand tough. The group plans subsequent demonstrations this week outside James\u2019 office in New York City and the Paramount lot in Hollywood. <\/p>\n

The jockeying comes as President Trump, who favors the Ellison takeover of CNN and Warner Bros., has barred CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House grounds because of reporting he dislikes.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump just locked CNN out of the White House. Now his billionaire allies want to own it,\u201d Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) added in a Sunday post<\/a>. \u201cState attorneys general: Don\u2019t settle. Hold the line. Block this merger.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tensions flared on the eve of a critical week ahead for Paramount Skydance\u2019s proposed $111-billion acquisition of Warner…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":854936,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[129301,360505,15284,3426,361055,91904,88,361054,361053,18080,361056,165680,92107,4208,3590,3291],"class_list":["post-854935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-bonta","tag-california-atty","tag-cnn","tag-company","tag-critical-week","tag-ellison","tag-entertainment","tag-hollywood-base","tag-hollywood-deal","tag-merger","tag-new-york-atty","tag-norm-eisen","tag-other-state","tag-paramount","tag-people","tag-settlement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=854935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/854936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=854935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=854935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=854935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}