The private equity firm that’s headed by Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner is part of the group that’s joining Paramount’s hostile takeover bid of Warner Bros. Discovery, regulatory filings revealed on Monday.
Kushner’s involvement in Paramount’s attempt to convince WBD shareholders to reject Netflix’s $82.7 billion deal, which was already approved by Warner’s board of directors, comes as Paramount chairman David Ellison insists that his offer has a better chance of clearing regulatory hurdles with the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, just as Ellison – whom the president has called a “great person” and repeatedly praised since taking over Paramount in August – announced he was launching a hostile takeover of WBD, Trump publicly blasted Paramount for allowing 60 Minutes to air an interview with Marjorie Taylor Greene.
“My real problem with the show, however, wasn’t the low IQ traitor, it was that the new ownership of 60 Minutes, Paramount, would allow a show like this to air,” Trump raged on Truth Social. “THEY ARE NO BETTER THAN THE OLD OWNERSHIP, who just paid me millions of Dollars for FAKE REPORTING about your favorite President, ME!”
The anti-Paramount screed is just the latest wrinkle in the increasingly bitter bidding war for Warner, which has also seen Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos make a secret pilgrimage to the White House last month in an effort to woo Trump over to his company’s side.
While the president is once again irate over a 60 Minutes segment and lashing out at Ellison on social media, the involvement of Kushner in the tender offer and the president’s chummy relationship with the Paramount chief and his father – Oracle founder and close Trump ally Larry Ellison – could help sway some WBD shareholders to press the board into accepting the Paramount bid, believing that Netflix could face more resistance from the White House.
However, even though Paramount is sweetening the pot and going public with its takeover attempt, it may not matter to Warner and the majority of its stockholders, who have concerns about Paramount’s other investors and were put off by Ellison’s unsolicited pursuit of WBD earlier this year.
According to Paramount’s SEC filing on Monday, which detailed the company’s $30-per-share public offering for Warner Bros. Discovery, Affinity Partners – the firm led by Kushner – has made investment commitments to the proposal. In fact, the filing revealed that Kushner’s group was part of last week’s bid that was ultimately rejected by Warner.
Affinity, along with the sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Abu Dhabi, have “agreed to forgo any governance rights – including board representation – associated with their non-voting equity investments,” according to Monday’s filing. The Middle Eastern public investment funds were also part of Paramount’s original Warner bid last week.
One of the significant points of contention the Warner Bros. board had with Paramount’s offer was its reliance on the Saudi money to complete its financing.
“The company was relying on billions of dollars from Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds, which would invite a review from the US government’s security apparatus,” Bloomberg reported. “Even if it passed, that was an additional inconvenience. Though Paramount had denied a report that it was receiving money from those funds, they were participants in its bid.”
In the filing on Monday, Paramount declared that the Ellisons and investment firm RedBird Capital would “backstop” all of the equity needed for the transaction.
“Each outstanding share of WBD Series A common stock will be exchanged for $30.00 per share in cash, reflecting a total equity value of $77.9 billion. Including the assumption of net debt and noncontrolling interest, this reflects an implied enterprise value of $108.4 billion,” the filing stated. “The Ellison family and RedBird have collectively committed to backstop 100% of the $40.7 billion of equity capital required for the Transaction.”
Besides Paramount increasing its offer significantly and revealing that the president’s son-in-law is part of the takeover bid, Ellison has also seemed to appeal to the president’s desire to see CNN – which is currently owned by WBD – come under the umbrella of CBS News and its “anti-woke” new editor in chief Bari Weiss.
As the deal currently stands, Warner Bros. Discovery will proceed with spinning off its linear TV properties from the rest of the company, while Netflix will acquire the film and television studios, along with HBO and streamer HBO Max. Discovery Global, which will become a separate company in late 2026 and includes CNN, TBS and TNT Sports, will not be part of the merged Netflix-Warner.
Instead, Netflix is offering WBD shareholders $27.75 a share, of which $23 will be paid in cash and the rest in stock of the spun-off television company. Ellison, meanwhile, is seeking to buy WBD in its entirety – which will include CNN and the rest of the cable assets.
“We want to build a scaled news service that is basically fundamentally in the trust business, that is in the truth business, and that speaks to the 70% of Americans that are in the middle,” Ellison told CNBS on Monday, declaring that he would combine CNN with CBS News if Paramount is successful in its hostile takeover.
Ellison also said he’s had “great conversations” with Trump about Paramount’s plan for its proposed CBS-CNN news business, but added that he didn’t want to speak for Trump.
While MAGA influencers are taking to social media to rage against the Netflix deal, saying “TRUMP MUST STOP THIS,” CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter noted that CNN was being used as a political football throughout this entire saga.
“At the risk of repeating myself, Netflix isn’t trying to buy CNN. But Paramount is,” he wrote on Monday morning, pointing out that “Ellison’s actions ‘most recently mirror those of Elon Musk,’ who fought to take over Twitter and won.”
