Bari Weiss was coy when the news broke Thursday that Netflix had withdrawn from its planned acquisition of Warner Bros., leaving the path open for Paramount Skydance to acquire the company.
Weiss wrote on X that she’d been at a Free Press debate, and said, “Nowhere I’d rather be. Though I hear there’s some news?”
The news was that her boss, David Ellison at Paramount Skydance, would likely soon be in charge of not just CBS, where Weiss is editor in chief, but also CNN, once the regulatory hurdles are cleared.
It was news that was received in certain circles with groaning and gnashing of teeth, given Ellison’s friendship with President Donald Trump and his associates.
But others see something more sinister at play, saying that it’s now conservatives who have a monopoly on media that must be broken up.
Weiss’s elevation to the head of CBS News last fall resulted in changes at the network that some see as catering to the president, although Weiss says she’s just seeking fairness, and coverage for the Americans who are ideologically from center-left to center-right.
Still, it didn’t take long for people to start predicting doom for CNN, so much so that leadership had to caution CNN staffers to “keep calm and carry on.” And much like the internet meme of Secretary of State Marco Rubio taking on every new job that becomes available, some have predicted Weiss will soon be in charge of CNN and that conservative commentator Scott Jennings would finally get his own CNN show.
CNN media analyst Brian Stelter finds himself in the peculiar position of commenting on events that might affect his own job. He has continued to write on it, saying in a special edition of his newsletter, “Anxieties are running high. It’s an especially fraught moment for journalists — with rising political pressures and shrinking job prospects across the industry."
But Stelter has also pointed out that the full picture of what is happening isn’t the MAGA-fication of CBS, as some have said.
Noting that Ellison had once donated $1 million to Joe Biden’s campaign, Stelter wrote, “The same company that cancelled Stephen Colbert’s late-night show on CBS also renewed Jon Stewart’s contract on Comedy Central and ordered more episodes of the Trump-skewering comedy ‘South Park.’ Maybe most importantly, CBS News continues to break hard-hitting stories about the Trump administration and other topics.”
That hasn’t stopped critics from accusing CBS of being a “Fox News wanna-be,” or Fox News from noticing potential competition. (Fox put out a press release this week comparing its ratings with CBS, with the headline “FOX NEWS CHANNEL TOPS CBS IN PRIMETIME FOR THE MONTH OF FEBRUARY.”)
Analysts have said that it may take six months to finalize the deal, and there’s always a chance that it falls through, although Stelter said “the conventional wisdom is that the Trump admin will wave it right through.” The California attorney general, Rob Bonta, however, said on X that it is “not a done deal” and that the California Department of Justice is investigating the legality of the deal.