The Paramount Global headquarters in New York, US, on Tuesday, Aug. 27, 2024.
Yuki Iwamura | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The Federal Communications Commission cleared the way Thursday for an $8 billion merger between Paramount and Skydance Media.
The deal, which was announced more than a year ago, includes the CBS broadcast television network, Paramount Pictures and the Nickelodeon channel.
“Americans no longer trust the legacy national news media to report fully, accurately, and fairly,” Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, wrote in a statement Thursday. “It is time for a change. That is why I welcome Skydance’s commitment to make significant changes at the once storied CBS broadcast network.”
Carr noted that Skydance had made written commitments to ensure the new company’s programing would have a diversity of viewpoints across the political and ideological spectrum. Skydance also said it would hire a third-party impartial outsider to report to the president of the new company to evaluate complaints of bias.
The FCC chairman also noted that Skydance does not have any DEI programs in place and has agreed not to establish any such initiatives at the new company.
The decision by the FCC to greenlight the merger was not unanimous. Commissioner Anna Gomez, the lone Democrat on the three-person commission, opposed the move, saying she was troubled by Paramount’s recent payment to settle a suit brought by President Donald Trump against CBS’s “60 Minutes.”
“The Paramount payout and this reckless approval have emboldened those who believe the government can — and should-abuse its power to extract financial and ideological concessions, demand favored treatment, and secure positive media coverage,” she wrote in a dissent statement.
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