{"id":818751,"date":"2025-01-10T10:12:02","date_gmt":"2025-01-10T16:12:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/10\/center-for-american-rights-files-fcc-petition-challenging-paramount-skydance-merger\/"},"modified":"2025-01-10T10:12:02","modified_gmt":"2025-01-10T16:12:02","slug":"center-for-american-rights-files-fcc-petition-challenging-paramount-skydance-merger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/10\/center-for-american-rights-files-fcc-petition-challenging-paramount-skydance-merger\/","title":{"rendered":"Center for American Rights Files FCC Petition Challenging Paramount-Skydance Merger"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Center for American Rights has filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission<\/a> expressing concerns over Paramount Global\u2019s pending $8 billion merger with Skydance Media. <\/p>\n

The non-profit, which describes itself as \u201cnon-partisan, public-interest law firm,\u201d says an investment in Skydance from China\u2019s Tencent Holdings raises questions about \u201ctroubling questions about undue foreign influence from China.\u201d It also claims that CBS News has \u201cexhibited improper ideological bias\u201d and that CBS Television has \u201capparently engaged in illegal racial quotas for its hiring.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Center asks the Commission to condition its grant of approval of the merger on specific commitments by the new corporation to address these issues, and to place the approval on a probationary status for an appropriate period of years until compliance with the conditions is evident,\u201d CAR wrote in its petition.<\/p>\n

Paramount and Skydance declined to comment on CAR\u2019s FCC petition. <\/p>\n

CAR\u2019s petition comes after the company filed a \u201cnews distortion\u201d complaint against CBS over a \u201c60 Minutes\u201d interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. President-elect Donald Trump has complained that CBS should lose its license over the interview, which he said was deceptively edited. Incoming FCC chairman Brendan Carr recently told Fox News that the complaint is \u201clikely to arise in the context of the FCC\u2019s review of that transaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In addition to the Center for American Rights, Paramount shareholder Mario Gabelli has asked the FCC to pause its review<\/a> of the transfer of broadcast licenses as he investigates \u201cpotential fiduciary and\/or federal securities violations\u201d against the media giant\u2019s minority shareholders.<\/p>\n

In a new letter<\/a>, Gabelli \u2014 whose firm beneficially owns 12.5% of the voting shares of Paramount making them the largest Class A shareholder behind Shari Redstone \u2014 said he is examining \u201cbreaches of fiduciary duties owed to minority shareholders by providing non-ratable benefits to NAI\/Shari Redstone such as an excessive control premium, personal loans, and significant severance packages.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also reiterated concerns that Paramount\u2019s S-4 for the Skydance deal does not provide adequate disclosures on the process leading to board\u2019s approval of the deal, the fairness of the consideration to shareholders and \u201cthe facts relevant to enable stockholders to ascertain whether consideration that should be paid to them is being diverted to NAI.\u201d<\/p>\n

Additionally, he said a recent amendment that David Ellison will control 100% of Paramount \u201conly compounds\u201d his concerns and that a books and records request filed with Paramount has provided \u201cminimal transparency into whether the control premium and other benefits to NAI\/Ms. Redstone were funded by capital that would have otherwise been paid to minority shareholders.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe transfer of Paramount and its subsidiary CBS to the control of a \u201csole manager\u201d that will not be subject to modulation by shareholders and in which shareholders are being obfuscated from learning basic details of the negotiation of the Transaction may have significant adverse effects on the public interest,\u201d the letter adds.<\/p>\n

Others who have filed petitions include LiveVideoAI.Corp<\/a>, which wanted to bid for Paramount and called the bidding process flawed, Fuse Media<\/a>, which said the restructured transaction and intention to use the technology, resources and expertise of Oracle to achieve post-transaction synergies is \u201clikely to exacerbate Paramount\u2019s current anticompetitive treatment of independent programming services to the detriment of competition and viewpoint diversity,\u201d One Ministries Inc.<\/a>, which is asking the FCC to require Paramount+ to carry any independent broadcast stations that want to be carried by the streaming service via must-carry rules.<\/p>\n

The Teamsters union<\/a> has also requested that transaction approval be conditioned upon maintaining minimum levels of guild-created content and station-level employment, expressing concern over Skydance\u2019s planned $2 billion in cost cuts following the deal\u2019s closing. <\/p>\n

All petitions to deny the Skydance deal were due Dec. 16, with oppositions due Jan. 2 and replies due Jan. 13.<\/p>\n

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Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

December 17, 2024 @ 4:01 PM The Center for American Rights has filed a petition with the Federal Communications Commission expressing concerns over Paramount Global\u2019s pending $8 billion merger with Skydance Media. The non-profit, which describes itself as \u201cnon-partisan, public-interest law firm,\u201d says an investment in Skydance from China\u2019s Tencent Holdings raises questions about \u201ctroubling<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":818752,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1963,144],"tags":[5637,5700],"class_list":{"0":"post-818751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-american","8":"category-center","9":"tag-american","10":"tag-center"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/818752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}