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Attempting to resolve California’s antitrust suit over its $110 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount Skydance is reportedly exploring multiple options – including a possible sale of CNN.
Reuters reports that Paramount Skydance’s chief legal officer Makan Delrahim attended Politico’s California Agenda conference on Tuesday, where he reportedly stated that a possible sale of CNN is “on the table”.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta is leading 11 other U.S. State Attorney Generals in challenging the merger, the last major regulatory obstacle after the UK cleared the takeover following five-year guarantees on programming and editorial independence for Channel 5 news from CNN International and CBS News.
The U.S. States challenging the merger claim that it would create a “media behemoth” that could raise prices and reduce competition in film and television markets. The other week, a federal judge set the dates for the antitrust trial for March next year.
This week, media reports have claimed that Paramount is considering pulling company operations out of California altogether. Delrahim says there is “a point at where you have a duty, a fiduciary duty to your shareholders, and those are the factors you consider.”
Talking about California’s likely next governor, former U.S. health secretary Xavier Becerra, Delrahim says: “If I was governor, I wouldn’t want to lose Hollywood from the state. I wouldn’t want to lose a major company like Paramount to another state.”
Separately, a Wall Street Journal report (via Yahoo) today indicates Paramount has discussed creating an editorial board for CNN and establishing other safeguards to protect the network’s editorial independence. The company responded to that claim, telling the outlet: “We always remain open to internal improvements to journalistic integrity.”
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