David Ellison in his own words
The first peep about David Ellison’s plans for Warner Bros. Discovery came 13 months ago, when the WSJ’s Jessica Toonkel broke the news that Paramount was preparing a bid for the company.
Ellison was measured in his public remarks during the bidding war, and he was especially limited in what he could say while regulators worldwide reviewed the merger. But now that the deal has taken effect, he feels free to speak.
“It was not easy to get here. At times, it was downright ugly,” Ellison said at a Day One town hall for Skydance employees yesterday.
Now it’s time to “turn the page and make sure we are in the business of rebuilding trust,” he said at a press conference last night.
Many of you have emailed me asking about what the merger will mean for CNN. So let’s walk through what Ellison said.
“We believe in editorial independence, and we will never interfere,” Ellison told Anderson Cooper, who moderated the employee event.
Cooper asked directly about CNN employees’ concerns and invoked many of the Paramount/CBS/Trump controversies we’ve covered for the past year.
In response, Ellison said, “I believe deeply in journalism,” and called the work done by CBS News and CNN “a vital part of our democracy.” He also affirmed that he supports CNN’s legal action against the Trump administration over White House access.
In the news space, “we want to actually help scale and transition the business digitally,” Ellison said. Citing Skydance’s estimate that the combined company reaches more than 200 million streaming subscribers, he said the company “can create an even bigger platform for the best journalism in the world.”
Cooper asked about the likelihood of a tie-up between “cousins” CBS and CNN in the future, and Ellison suggested it’s too soon to have answers about that. He said he intends to bring the business leaders “into the decision-making” and indicated that integration decisions would likely come within “120 days.”
At the press conference, Ellison praised both his news leaders, saying, “We’re thrilled, obviously, with Mark [Thompson]. We’re thrilled with Bari [Weiss].”
>> On CNN last night, Jake Tapper shared Ellison’s pledge not to interfere in coverage and said, “We here at ‘The Lead’ want you to know that we take Mr. Ellison at his word and we will hold him to it.”
‘We are now turning the page’
When Trump was asked about the merger yesterday, he complimented the Ellisons, saying, “They’re terrific people, and it’s going to be a great company.”
At the presser a few hours later, Status editor Jon Passantino asked about the Trump factor, and Ellison answered: “We have a good relationship with this administration. I also had a really good relationship with President Biden. I have a good relationship with Senator Tim Scott, and I have a good relationship with Governor Gavin Newsom. I think it is important to talk to everybody, on both sides of the aisle.”
“We want to speak to everybody,” Ellison went on. “We do not want to politicize the company.” Then, seemingly referring back to his previous meetings with Trump, Ellison said, “We were in a transaction review process. But with that said, we are now turning that page.”
His answer when another reporter asked how Skydance will win over people who opposed the merger: “We’re going to make sure that CNN and CBS News are completely editorially independent. We’re going to build a streaming service that can compete with anybody. And I think that when we actually follow through on all of those promises, I believe it will rebuild trust.” Here’s our full story with even more quotes…
“The Skydance era is officially underway in Hollywood,” Joe Kernen said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” this morning. Ellison is “adding new members to the board, including investor and philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs and former Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. Former UK prime minister Tony Blair will also become a board advisor.”
Powell Jobs is also the majority owner of The Atlantic and a prominent Democratic donor. Andrew Ross Sorkin said he interpreted the Powell Jobs appointment as “an effort to try to calm the waters.”
“Of course,” guest Matt Belloni said, adding: “Remember, one of the first things David Ellison did when he took over Paramount was he put Sherry Lansing on the board. She’s the former chairwoman of Paramount Pictures. Amazing relationships within Hollywood. And that was a message to the community that ‘I’m of you.’ This is the exact same thing. ‘We’re done with the deal, let’s move on.’”
>> Coming up: Ellison and Ynon Kreiz will be on “Squawk Box” at 8:45 a.m. Eastern tomorrow before ringing the opening bell at the NYSE.
>> Further reading: THR’s Alex Weprin reconstructed “how David Ellison’s Skydance outwitted everyone.”
Today marks 30 years since Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes launched Fox News, a scrappy challenger that became the biggest cable channel in America.
Fox’s legacy is sitting in the White House right now. As I wrote five years ago at the 25th anniversary mark, “Trump is Fox’s biggest contribution to American history to date,” and that still holds true today.
Fox helped turn Trump from a celebrity businessman into a GOP political force, and over time reshaped itself in his image, with its biggest stars becoming some of his fiercest defenders and most influential advisers. It will be fascinating to see how Fox handles the next few years.
But I can confidently say that Fox is bigger than any president. It’s more like a movement and, for some superfans, almost an identity. It’s also a permanent driver of political polarization in America.
“Fox News has spent the past 30 years airing a nonstop stream of bile, misinformation, bigotry, and stupidity,” longtime Fox opponent Oliver Willis wrote at Daily Kos. Fox’s Karl Rove wrote the counterargument in this op-ed for the network: Fox “filled a void left by liberal media bias.”
Fox and its sister outlet, the New York Post, have published many videos and stories marking the anniversary. But as the NYT’s Ben Mullin noted, there’s one “conspicuous omission”: Roger Ailes, the man whose vision — and iron grip — defined Fox long before Trump.
>> Here’s some incredible YouTube footage from Fox’s first moments on the air. You may recognize a few faces, like Bill O’Reilly and Neil Cavuto…
Speaking of Fox, the president attacked the network again yesterday after Bill Hemmer dared to interview Dan Osborn, the independent candidate challenging GOP Sen. Pete Ricketts in Nebraska. Trump called Osborn a “sleazebag” and complained in a Truth Social screed: “Why are they doing this???… The ‘other side’ doesn’t give our people any positive exposure or airtime.”
VF’s Aidan McLaughlin pointed out the irony: “Trump, who banned outlets from the White House on the basis of his claim that one-sided news poses a national security threat, is demanding that Fox make its news more one-sided.”
Andrew Kirell writes: Disney’s legal team argued in federal court yesterday that the FCC has “chilled” ABC’s free speech by using its “enormous regulatory power to coerce, threaten, punish” coverage the administration doesn’t like.
“We are chilled,” Beth Wilkinson, ABC’s attorney, told US District Judge Loren AliKhan during the nearly two-hour hearing. The threat of losing local station licenses, Wilkinson said, amounts to a “corporate death penalty” for ABC. Invoking the French Revolution, she compared the administration’s pressure to keeping the network’s “head on a guillotine” as it continues reporting, leaving ABC to “wonder if anything we say is going to make that come down.”
FCC lawyers argued that the US District Court lacks jurisdiction to review the agency’s license-renewal order and that ABC is a “regulated entity that is undergoing a review by its regulator” and cannot circumvent the regulatory process with this lawsuit.
The judge did not issue a ruling right away. She gave both sides until next Wednesday to provide additional materials and responses. Read our full story here…
Liam Reilly writes: A federal judge has denied a bid from Jacqueline Smith, the fired Stars and Stripes ombudsman, for a preliminary injunction that would have returned her to work.
However, Judge Amit P. Mehta “allowed her lawsuit alleging unlawful termination to proceed despite the Pentagon’s request to dismiss it,” Svetlana Shkolnikova reported for Stripes.
The judge “also refused the Pentagon’s push to dismiss the case, questioning if the legal precedent that does not protect Smith’s speech should apply to government-employed journalists…”
Local news giant Sinclair “is launching a subscription-focused, national news brand on Substack called ‘The National Press,’” Sara Fischer scoops for Axios. The brand will “feature three new original programs, including a daily news show anchored by Lyndsay Keith,” a former Newsmax co-host. It will launch “with both free and paid tiers on Substack.”
Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley says it could become “a core part of our digital offering, if we hit the targets and the expectations that we have…”
The Pulitzer-winning nonprofit news outlet is celebrating its tenth anniversary tonight and tomorrow in Jackson, Mississippi, with a sold-out event, featuring keynote speaker John Grisham and appearances by the aforementioned Laurene Powell Jobs along with Darren Walker, Bill Bynum, Kara Swisher and co-founder Andy Lack, who recently pledged a $12 million personal donation to local nonprofit news.
“As news deserts unfortunately spread across the country, the great team at Mississippi Today has spent a decade proving there’s another way — building trusted, independent journalism that serves communities and holds power accountable,” Lack told me.
It’s a valuable success story. Mississippi Today has expanded into Deep South Today, with two Louisiana outlets and a planned expansion into Arkansas later this year…
>> “60 Minutes” averaged 10.2 million viewers last Sunday, surpassing “last season’s average audience for the series” for the first time this season, Brian Steinberg reports. (Variety)
>> Sean Giancola “is stepping down as publisher and CEO of the New York Post Media Group after more than a decade with the company,” A.J. Katz writes. News Corp “did not name an interim successor” and says the search for his replacement is underway. (TheWrap)
>> Facebook is limiting how many external links some professional pages can post without a paid subscription — but news publishers are exempt, for now, Charlotte Tobitt reports. (Press Gazette)
>> In Turkey, journalism groups are calling on X “not to accept requests by the authorities to restrict access to accounts held by journalists and media outlets” without a “clear and independently reviewable judicial decision.” The groups say X keeps complying with requests that lack “adequate judicial scrutiny.” (Reuters)
>> In the UK, Meta is under investigation “for a potential breach of the UK’s digital safety laws after launching a Snapchat-style feature on Instagram.” (The Guardian)
>> In New York, “a man who used AI songs to steal millions in music royalties has been sentenced to 18 months in prison, capping off the first-ever criminal case over streaming fraud.” (Billboard)
I absolutely loved this story in today’s WSJ headlined “Oracle, Billionaire, YouTube Nut.”
Gregory Zuckerman wrote: “Feeling guilty about spending hours each day watching YouTube? Don’t be. Warren Buffett is right there with you.”
“Glenn Close clips. Commercials from the 1950s. Paul Anka videos. The famed investor can’t get enough,” he wrote. “Buffett enjoys speeches by complete unknowns. He’s a fan of Berkshire Hathaway’s own content, too, proud of how it performs on the video platform. He watches it all, nearly every evening, usually from a recliner in his Omaha home.”
Read about Buffett’s journeys “down random rabbit holes” here via this gift link…
This edition of Reliable Sources was edited by Andrew Kirell and produced with Liam Reilly. Email us your feedback and tips here.