Joe Flint, Brian Schwartz, and Natalie Andrews, reporting for The Wall Street Journal (gift link, also in News+):

“Just tried calling you about new bid we have submitted,” Ellison texted Zaslav. “I heard you on all your concerns and believe we have addressed them in our new proposal. Please give me a call back when you can to discuss in detail.”

He didn’t hear back.

Sensing trouble, Ellison followed up, saying Paramount had offered a package that covered all the issues Warner had raised, including the need for “strong cash value” and “speed to close.”

“It would be the honor of a lifetime to be your partner and to be the owner of these iconic assets,” he texted, according to a regulatory filing.

Desperation is never a good look.

During a visit to Washington in recent days, David Ellison offered assurances to Trump administration officials that if he bought Warner, he’d make sweeping changes to CNN, a common target of President Trump’s ire, people familiar with the matter said. Trump has told people close to him that he wants new ownership of CNN as well as changes to CNN programming.

Lickspittling is never a good look, either. David Ellison cuts the figure of a pathetic little man, a mere shadow of his father. (I’ll bet he gets along well with Don Jr. and Eric.) And Trump is now already pissed that Ellison hasn’t turned 60 Minutes into Fox and Friends.

The Guardian:

There on a plinth, with “Donald J Trump” emblazoned on it in capital letters, was the uncoveted trophy: a golden globe resting on five golden hands big enough to compensate any tiny-handed recipient feeling sore about the Nobel peace prize.

But wait, there was more. “There is also a beautiful medal for you that you can wear everywhere you want to go,” added Infantino, knowing that with Trump there is no such thing as too much.

Glowing oranger than usual under the stage lights, Trump eagerly put the medal around his neck without waiting for Infantino to do the honours. He told the audience of 2,000 people: “This is truly one of the great honours of my life.”

It’s just perfect that Trump put the medal around his own neck.

The jokes practically wrote themselves.

Donald Trump, on his blog:

The only reason Marjorie “Traitor” Brown (Green turns Brown under stress!) went BAD is that she was JILTED by the President of the United States (Certainly not the first time she has been jilted!). Too much work, not enough time, and her ideas are, NOW, really BAD — She sort of reminds me of a Rotten Apple! Marjorie is not AMERICA FIRST or MAGA, because nobody could have changed her views so fast, and her new views are those of a very dumb person. That was proven last night when washed up, Trump hating, 60 Minutes “correspondent,” Lesley Stahl, who still owes me an apology from when she attacked me on the show (with serious conviction!), that Hunter Biden’s LAPTOP FROM HELL was produced by Russia, not Hunter himself (TOTALLY PROVEN WRONG!), interviewed a very poorly prepared Traitor, who in her confusion made many really stupid statements. My real problem with the show, however, wasn’t the low IQ traitor, it was that the new ownership of 60 Minutes, Paramount, would allow a show like this to air. THEY ARE NO BETTER THAN THE OLD OWNERSHIP, who just paid me millions of Dollars for FAKE REPORTING about your favorite President, ME! Since they bought it, 60 Minutes has actually gotten WORSE! Oh well, far worse things can happen. P.S. I hereby demand a complete and total APOLOGY, though far too late to be meaningful, from Lesley Stahl and 60 Minutes for her incorrect and Libelous statements about Hunter’s Laptop!!! President DJT

Trump’s expectation isn’t that 60 Minutes, along with the entirety of CBS News, along with the entirety of CBS TV programming, would tilt in Trump’s direction after its acquisition (as part of Paramount) by David Ellison’s Skydance. Trump’s expectation is that all of CBS, every minute of the broadcast day, should appeal to and appease him.

Ben Thompson at Stratechery yesterday:

It’s important to note that the President does not have final say in the matter: President Trump directed the DOJ to oppose AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner, but the DOJ lost in federal court, much to AT&T’s detriment. Indeed, the irony of mergers and regulatory review is that the success of the latter is often inversely correlated to the wisdom of the former: the AT&T deal for Time Warner never made much sense, which is directly related to why it (correctly) was approved. It would have been economically destructive for AT&T to, say, limit Time Warner content to its networks, so suing over that theoretical possibility was ultimately unsuccessful.

Thompson also makes clear that Paramount itself couldn’t possibly launch a credible bid for Warner Bros.:

Paramount’s bid, it should be noted, was for the entire Warner Bros. Discovery business, including the TV and cable networks that will be split off next year; Netflix is only buying the Warner Bros. part. Puck reported that the stub Netflix is leaving behind is being valued at $5/share, which would mean that Netflix outbid Paramount.

And, it should be noted, that Paramount money wouldn’t be from the actual business, which is valued at a mere $14 billion; new owner David Ellison is the son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison, who is worth $275 billion. Netflix, meanwhile, is worth $425 billion and generated $9 billion in cash flow over the last year. Absent family money this wouldn’t be anywhere close to a fair fight.

It’s not illegal or even sketchy for an acquisition to be backed by family money from an entirely separate source (in the Ellisons’ case, Oracle), but it certainly makes more business sense for Netflix to make this acquisition than Paramount. There’s a strong argument that David Ellison doesn’t really know what the fuck he’s doing in the media racket; no one would argue that Netflix doesn’t know exactly what they’re doing.

The Wall Street Journal yesterday:

Paramount launched a $77.9 billion hostile takeover offer for Warner Bros. Discovery Monday, taking its case for acquiring the storied entertainment company directly to shareholders just days after Warner agreed to a deal with Netflix.

Paramount, run by David Ellison, is arguing that its all-cash $30-a-share offer for all of Warner, owner of networks such as CNN, TBS and HGTV as well as the HBO Max streaming service, is a better deal for shareholders and more likely to pass regulatory muster.

“We’re really here to finish what we started,” Ellison said on CNBC Monday morning.

The “more likely to pass regulatory muster” bit is a euphemism for the Ellisons (David, and the real player here, his $250+-billion-dollar-net-worth father Larry) being on the inside of the Trump administration oligarchy. It’s so transparent that Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner is part of the hostile bid, along with sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, and Qatar.

That said, while the Executive Branch is influential in such regulatory approvals, it’s not completely under their control. The U.S. court system, while under duress from this administration, remains independent, and with admittedly notable exceptions, remains largely on the up-and-up.

And CNN’s Brian Stelter reports that Netflix was prepared for this:

“Today’s move was entirely expected,” Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said on stage at a UBS conference just now, waving off Paramount’s hostile play for WBD. “We have a deal done, and we are incredibly happy with the deal... We’re super confident we’re going to get it across.”