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Paramount CEO David Ellison believes that opposition to his planned Warner Bros. merger isn’t truly about market share but rather whether he “can be trusted as a steward of Warner’s CNN.”
Unfortunately for Ellison, much of the distrust is coming from inside the house.
In a striking New York Times guest essay published on Tuesday, Ellison wrote that others have attempted to tell his story while he remained silent because the head of a news organization “shouldn’t put a finger on the scale,” but he wouldn’t remain silent any longer.
The essay quickly spread through CNN, where concerned staffers attempted to read between the lines to see if it offered a glimmer of hope. One CNN employee flatly rejected the notion that Ellison’s essay will ease tensions, while CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter called it “remarkable.”
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Ellison’s Paramount is attempting to build a media empire of historic proportions by acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery for $111 billion. The European Union and the U.S. Justice Department have each signed off on the deal, with the final roadblocks coming from an antitrust lawsuit led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta and a suit from the Writers Guild of America. Paramount recently agreed to delay the deal until next year while the lawsuits play out in court.
“The states claim this deal will give one company too much influence over theatrical releases and cable operators, while the W.G.A. argues that our combined market power will hurt writers. Both suits imagine a Hollywood that no longer exists — an industry ruled by a handful of legacy studios,” Ellison wrote.
Ellison noted that “a combined Paramount-Warner would account for less than 20 percent” of the time Americans spend watching television and “just 18 percent” of the domestic box office over the past 12 months.
“Those are not the numbers of a company that can dictate what audiences watch or what writers get paid,” Ellison wrote.
“I believe this fight is not really about market share,” Ellison continued. “The issue is whether I can be trusted as a steward of Warner’s CNN. There has been speculation about my politics, my loyalties, my intentions.”
CNN has been plagued with morale issues ahead of the looming merger, as the network has seen multiple leadership changes in recent memory and there is widespread concern about the direction of the network under Ellison. Some staffers are anxious about job security, while others are frightened that Bari Weiss, Ellison’s handpicked editor-in-chief of CBS News who irks liberals throughout the media industry, would take on an oversight position at CNN.
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Ellison has previously publicly vowed that CNN will maintain its editorial independence, but skeptics don’t seem to take his promise at face value. Critics of Weiss and Ellison have accused them of bending the knee to Trump and trying to curry favor with his administration, but the high-powered mogul continues to insist that is not the case.
“I have regularly voted for candidates of both parties; I hold some views that would be called conservative and others that would be called liberal, just like most Americans; and when it comes to our news operations, I do not aspire to lead these companies to bend their newsrooms to my views. I believe that news should be based on facts and truth,” Ellison wrote.
“Great news organizations like CNN and CBS News are here to tell it straight down the middle,” he added. “That requires newsrooms that reflect the whole world, not one side of it. And it requires independence.”
Ellison wrote that CNN journalists would “continue to answer to the facts and to all the people they serve — not to any party or cause,” once he takes control.
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Ellison, the son of billionaire Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, then noted that only 28 percent of Americans trust the news, citing a recent Gallup study.
“The temptation is to say the problem lies elsewhere. Our obligation is to look inward and say: We can do better. We are in a moment when Americans trust few institutions, but journalists haven’t always helped their case by refusing to engage with critiques,” Ellison wrote. “Trust can’t be argued back, but it can be earned back — story by story, day by day.”
A veteran CNN staffer suggested that Ellison’s essay won’t exactly lift spirits.
“I don’t think it will calm the nerves of anyone at CNN! No one is worried about his politics, we’re worried that he doesn’t have any affection for the role of journalism,” the staffer told Fox News Digital.
“And as much as he paid lip service in this piece to those concerns, we don’t really have to guess at what he’d do — his moves at CBS have reflected the opposite,” they continued. “A disregard for independent storytelling, holding powerful people accountable, and investing in journalists and journalism, as executed by his hire, Bari Weiss.”
CNN declined comment when reached by Fox News Digital.
A former CNN producer, who isn’t a fan of the direction the network has swung in recent years, doesn’t believe the essay will go over well with ex-colleagues.
“David Ellison is making clear that under his leadership, CNN and CBS News must stop ‘refusing to engage’ with critics of their liberal bias and ‘look inward.’ He probably didn’t realize that he’s kicking a hornet’s nest,” the ex-CNN producer said.
“The folks at CNN and CBS News view any challenge to their biased, disconnected and badly produced programming as a violation of their free speech rights, and they’re coming at David and Bari with everything they’ve got,” the source continued. “David is going to have to burn both places down before he can fix them.”
CBS News did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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