Exclusive | Trump says he needs a new proprietor for CNN as half of any sale of Warner Bros. Discovery

Donald Trump said he needs a new proprietor for CNN as half of any sale of its mum or dad Warner Bros. Discovery – a signal that he prefers an offer by Paramount Skydance to buy the media conglomerate versus last week’s winning bid from Netflix.

Streaming big Netflix has agreed to purchase WBD’s Warner Bros. studio and its HBO Max streaming service, leaving CNN’s current management intact. But Paramount Skydance needs to purchase all of WBD including CNN – and put the latter under the news chief of its CBS subsidiary, Bari Weiss. 

In the latest in a string of extraordinary declarations in the historical past of US regulation, Trump signaled he’s straight inserting himself into a review of the WBD sale, telling reporters outright on Wednesday afternoon that it’s crucial for CNN to be under fully new management. 

President Trump signaled he’s straight inserting himself into a review of the WBD sale. AP

“I think any deal, it should be guaranteed and certain that CNN is part of it or sold separately, but I don’t think the people that are running that company right now and running CNN, which is a very dishonest group of people, I don’t think that should be allowed to continue,” the president said.

Insiders say Trump’s comments come as Paramount Skydance’s house owners, David Ellison and his father Larry, have been scrambling to do injury control with the White House over an explosive “60 Minutes” interview with Marjorie Taylor Greene by which the MAGA apostate slammed the president. 

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The sources say Paramount’s brass insists that “60 Minutes” staffers saved them principally in the darkish about the controversial interview that aired Sunday evening – which provoked Trump to declare that Paramount Skydance and its management “ARE NO BETTER THAN THE OLD OWNERSHIP.”

“Since they bought it, 60 Minutes has actually gotten WORSE!” Trump added of the Ellisons. 

Insiders say Trump’s comments come as Paramount Skydance’s house owners, David Ellison (above) and his father Larry, have been scrambling to do injury control with the White House. REUTERS

In addition to tearing “Marjorie Traitor Greene,” the president called “60 Minutes” correspondent Leslie Stahl a “Trump hating, 60 Minutes ‘correspondent,” Trump added: 

“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,” the president added.

Sources say Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison has told people close to Trump he was unaware of the broadcast until the day it ran, as was Jeff Shell, president of Paramount Skydance, and Weiss.

“They’re saying those guys went rogue and when Paramount Skydance found out about it, they were caught flatfooted,” said one particular person with direct information of the matter.

“I think any deal, it should be guaranteed and certain that CNN is part of it or sold separately,” President Trump said Wednesday. AP

A Paramount Skydance spokeswoman referred all inquiries to CBS Rep Chris Ender who each declined remark and wouldn’t deny the substance of this account.

All of which underscores the difficulty in working a news operation – or any extremely regulated business – in the period of Trump, who has insert himself into major company finance offers in methods that are unprecedented. Trump’s comments about CNN, media industry insiders say, exhibits he’s trying to exert most strain to mildew the deal to suit his political objectives. 

As the Post has beforehand reported, Trump needs CNN’s alleged anti-MAGA bias “neutralized” and that was one cause he was siding with the Ellisons in the deal contest.

Indeed, half of Paramount’s sales pitch to the WBD shareholders to ditch the Netflix bid is “regulatory certainty” from the Trump White House. It argues that it has less antitrust overlap with WBD than Netflix. Another promoting point is that Larry Ellison has been a long-time MAGA supporter.

On Monday, Paramount Skydance launched a “hostile bid” to undo Warner Bros Discovery’s resolution last week to pick Netflix, arguing its $30 a share all money offer is superior to Netflix’s cash-stock offer of $30,75. Netflix is bidding on just shopping for the Warner Studio and streaming service, and counts as half of its bid an eventual spinoff of WBD’s cable properties like Discovery and CNN.

Aside from the tough Trumpy politics, money might be a key variable in the deal. As The Post first reported, each Paramount Skydance and Netflix are poised to mount a bidding war for the media company that may take the profitable price to $35 a share or $91 billion. Before WBD started procuring itself, it had a market worth of round $31 billion.

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