“The Wall Street Journal” reports Larry Ellison made the offer in return for sign-off on the company’s bid for Warner Bros. Discovery.

Paramount Skydance denies Trump was offered overhaul of CNN in return for merger approval

"The Wall Street Journal" reports Larry Ellison made the offer in return for sign-off on the company's bid for Warner Bros. Discovery.

By Raechal Shewfelt

Raechal Shewfelt

Raechal Shewfelt is a writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2024. Her work has previously appeared on Yahoo and in American *Journalism Review* and *The Shreveport Times*.

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June 25, 2026 5:53 p.m. ET

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President Trump and Larry Ellison at the White House in 2025. Credit:

Andrew Harnik/Getty

- Paramount Skydance tells * *that President Trump was not promised an overhaul of CNN with an eventual merger of the company and Warner Bros. Discovery.

- *The Wall Street Journal* reported this week that Larry Ellison, whose son David oversees Paramount, made the offer directly.

- Trump has had a rocky relationship for years with the cable news network.

Paramount Skydance says there have been no pledges to make CNN kinder and gentler toward President Donald Trump with a prospective deal to acquire the channel's parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery.

"No commitments from either David or Larry Ellison have been made to any government body, State AG or federal agency regarding the future of CNN or any other news property, other than the goal to deliver truth-based journalism," a spokesman for the company told ** on Thursday, mirroring a statement first given to *The Wall Street Journal** *

The newspaper reported Monday that "Larry Ellison told Trump that if Paramount landed the Warner deal, it could overhaul CNN." It noted that neither are "fans of the cable news channel, believing it is biased toward liberal news and against the administration, according to people familiar with the matter."

This is significant, of course, because Ellison's son, David, is CEO of Paramount Skydance. The elder Ellison is a friend and financial supporter of Trump.

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White House spokesman Kush Desai told EW, "President Trump has consistently maintained that he was neutral to all parties throughout the Warner Bros. Discovery bidding process."

Earlier this month, the Justice Department said it would not challenge the massive merger, which will put David Ellison in control of not only two major TV news networks, CNN and CBS News, but two major streaming services and movie studios.

Lesley Stahl says Paramount boss David Ellison promised editorial independence for '60 Minutes'

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The deal is estimated to be worth $111 billion, according to *The New York Times*.

It comes at a critical time for the news industry. Earlier this month, veteran journalist Scott Pelley spoke out after being fired from longtime CBS news magazine *60 Minutes*. He took issue with the new editor-in-chief of CBS News, Bari Weiss.

The CNN logo. CNN

She took the position in October of last year, after Skydance Media acquired Paramount Global and its assets. Leaders at the show, including executive editor Draggan Mihailovich and executive producer Tanya Simon, were fired. Correspondents including Sharyn Alfonsi, Anderson Cooper, and Cecilia Vega left, as well.

Pelley, who had worked on the show since 2004, told Weiss during a June 1 staff meeting that she was "murdering" the highly decorated news program.

Trump has long held a disdain for the media, CNN in particular. During a June 3 news conference at the White House, for instance, he alleged that the network's Kaitlan Collins had "hatred in her eyes." He called the network "very corrupt" and "crooked as hell," before remarking that the "corrupt reporter" in front of him "never smiles" and stands there "with hatred in her eyes."

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