A Pro-Trump Billionaire Is About to Own CNN

Paramount acquiring Warner Bros means that CNN will be controlled by a MAGA billionaire with an agenda

This got a little lost because of our new war in Iran, but last Thursday was a very dark day for democracy.

Netflix decided to pull out of negotiations to purchase Warner Bros. Discovery, which means the company will almost certainly become part of Paramount/Skydance.

That means two of Hollywood's biggest movie and TVB studios, HBO, CBS, and CNN will all be under the control of this billionaire.

This is David Ellison, a pro-Trump billionaire who just happened to be Lindsey Graham’s guest at the State of the Union on Tuesday. Ellison’s father is Larry Ellison, one of the richest men in the world and a close friend of Donald Trump who helped bankroll this deal for his son. The other major funders of the acquisition are Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds that are also close to Trump.

This is a nightmare scenario for democracy. It’s not that Netflix is some great corporate citizen, but they were only buying Warner Bros.’ film and TV studios. CNN would have remained independent as part of a standalone company.

Instead, even more of the American media will now be controlled by right-wing billionaires with MAGA values who are eager to appease Trump.

With the U.S. at war and the Trump Administration trying to control the narrative, the stakes could not be higher.

Bad News for CNN (and Democracy)

Ellison’s rise to power in Hollywood has been a masterclass in corruption. To get Trump administration approval for his original acquisition of Paramount last year, CBS settled a frivolous lawsuit and put $16 million in Trump’s pocket. Ellison then installed Bari Weiss as head of CBS News — despite her lack of television news experience — as a signal to Trump that he would tilt his media properties in a more MAGA-friendly direction.

CNN is almost certainly next. Earlier this year, the Wall Street Journal reported that during a visit to Washington, Ellison offered assurances to Trump administration officials that if he bought Warner, he’d make sweeping changes to CNN. Trump has told people close to him that he wants new ownership of CNN and changes to its programming.

It’s not just that Ellison is ideologically conservative — he clearly is. It’s that he leveraged his relationship with Trump to smooth the regulatory road for this purchase. Trump helped make this deal happen, and now Ellison owes him.

What Ellison has done at CBS shows that he views making his media properties pro-Trump as one way to repay that debt.

One piece of evidence of how Ellison and Weiss have shifted CBS to the right: on Sunday, the panel on Face the Nation included only guests who supported Trump’s attack on Iran.

Under Ellison and Weiss, CBS is covering Trump’s war in Iran the way Fox News covered George W. Bush’s war in Iraq.

CNN is not perfect — see: Scott Jennings — but it does a lot of important, independent journalism. It’s still the place to turn during a crisis, and unlike so many others, it still covers what’s happening around the world. Putting CNN under the thumb of a right-wing billionaire who sees journalism as a tool to appease Trump is very bad news for both journalism and democracy. It means one less entity willing to hold the powerful accountable — which is exactly what Ellison and Trump want.

A Crisis Moment for American Media

Pro-Trump billionaires now own:

• CBS

• Washington Post

• The Wall Street Journal

• Fox News

• TikTok

• Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp

• Twitter/X

And many of the outlets not owned by Trump billionaires are owned by corporations too afraid to anger him.

The Right controls the means of media production and distribution in this country. They decide which stories get told and which don’t, which issues get highlighted and which get buried. It’s an enormously powerful megaphone — particularly in the hands of a corrupt authoritarian like Trump.

Democrats must fight back. Democratic attorneys general are going to try to stop this merger. Democratic lawmakers have threatened to use their power to investigate and potentially break up some of the companies built to promote Trump and MAGA content. But it can’t stop there. Democrats cannot count on the corporate media to simply do better. We have to incubate and nurture an independent, pro-democracy media ecosystem that isn’t beholden to big corporations or bowing down to Trump.

The future of media is smaller, independent outlets fueled by creators you know and trust — journalists and writers who aren’t owned by a billionaire, don’t have a corporate parent nervous about angering Trump, and aren’t going to soften their coverage to smooth a regulatory approval.

That’s exactly why I started Message Box. Not to build a media empire, but to have a place where I can tell you what I actually think — about Trump, about the Democratic Party, about what’s happening to this country.

If you’ve been reading for a while and getting value from it, now is the time to become a paid subscriber. I’m offering 20% off — but only for a limited time. Paid subscribers get full access to everything: the mailbag, the deep dives, the strategy memos, and the knowledge that you’re directly funding independent, pro-democracy media at a moment when it’s never mattered more.

The right controls the means of media production and distribution in this country. The only way to build a counterweight is for people like you to directly support people like me.