On September 11, 2025, the U.S. media landscape was rocked by the announcement of a colossal merger between Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery. If approved, this deal would erase one of the five remaining major movie studios and create a media behemoth controlling more than a quarter of the $223 billion American media market, according to The Conversation. The implications stretch far beyond the box office or streaming wars—this merger could fundamentally reshape the nation’s newsrooms, political discourse, and even the infrastructure that powers digital media.
The driving force behind this consolidation is David Ellison, CEO of Paramount Skydance, with strong backing from his father, Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle and one of the world’s richest men. Oracle, as the fifth-largest cloud provider, already plays a pivotal role in digital content delivery—think of it as the backbone that moves movies, shows, and news from servers to your screen. By merging media production, iconic brands like Harry Potter and Barbie, and the digital infrastructure itself, the Ellisons are constructing a vertically integrated empire. As The New York Times recently noted, Larry Ellison "may be closer to Mr. Trump than any mogul this side of Elon Musk."
The merger’s scale is staggering. The combined entity would control nearly half of the cable television market, including heavyweights like HBO and CNN, and would unite streaming giants HBO Max, Paramount+, and Discovery. In the film world, it would capture almost a third of production market share, rivaling Disney and Comcast’s NBCUniversal. For the average viewer, it might sound like more content for less money, but experts warn the price could be much steeper: diminished media diversity and increased risk of political manipulation.
Historically, U.S. antitrust agencies have scrutinized such mega-mergers, especially in media, due to fears that too much power in too few hands threatens diversity of viewpoints and opens the door to ideological bias. According to research from the Global Media & Internet Concentration Project, this new conglomerate would wield unprecedented bargaining power over streaming competitors, advertisers, distributors, and even its own workforce.
But the story doesn’t end there. The Trump administration’s fingerprints are all over this deal. The FCC gave its blessing, but with strict political strings attached: Paramount Skydance had to hire an ombudsman to oversee CBS’s reporting and eliminate all diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives at the network. David Ellison agreed, appointing Kenneth Weinstein, a former CEO of the conservative Hudson Institute and Trump’s ambassador to Japan, as ombudsman. He also reportedly pursued Bari Weiss, a prominent conservative journalist, to shape the editorial direction at CBS News. These moves signal a clear shift—editorial independence at CBS, and possibly soon CNN, could be subject to ideological oversight.
Financial settlements have also played a role in smoothing the merger’s path. Ahead of regulatory review, Paramount-owned CBS paid $16.5 million to Donald Trump to settle a lawsuit over alleged "deceptive" editing of an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. While such editing is standard in journalism, the settlement underscored the leverage the administration holds over media companies. ABC, facing a similar lawsuit, settled with a $15 million donation to the planned Trump Library.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has slashed $1.1 billion in public media funding, targeting PBS, NPR, and more than 1,500 local news affiliates, all accused by Trump of "partisan bias." This has accelerated the decline of local, independent news—a crucial check on power at every level of government. As public and local media lose funding, the major players left—Fox Corporation, Sinclair Broadcasting, and the soon-to-be Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery—would together control about one-third of all U.S. media. That’s a consolidation reminiscent of the partisan media model seen in Hungary under Viktor Orbán, where political leaders exert tight control over the press.
It’s not just television and film at stake. As reported by The New York Times, Larry Ellison is also positioned to take control of TikTok, the wildly popular social media platform, as part of a U.S.-China deal. If successful, this would place a major social network under the stewardship of Ellison, the Murdoch family, and Michael Dell—three reliably Republican billionaires. The rightward shift in media ownership is part of a broader strategy, described by some analysts as a form of "encirclement," where adversaries are surrounded, denied resources, and ultimately deprived of influence.
Sinclair and Nexstar Media Group, two conservative companies, together own or operate over 386 television stations. If Nexstar’s acquisition of Tegna is approved, that number could rise to 450, reaching up to 80% of U.S. households. Studies have shown that when Sinclair acquires a station and sets programming policy, the Republican share of the local vote rises by 3 to 5 percentage points. The impact on local democracy and political balance is significant—and growing.
Trump and his allies have not hesitated to use state power to pressure media outlets. In recent weeks, Trump has threatened to revoke the licenses of critical TV networks and pushed for tighter control over Pentagon reporting. The Department of Defense, now renamed the Department of War, has imposed new rules requiring all information to be approved before release, even if unclassified. According to MSNBC, Trump has also celebrated the departure of liberal media figures, with his FCC appointee boasting, “NPR has been defunded. PBS has been defunded. Colbert is retiring. Joy Reid is out at MSNBC. Terry Moran is gone from ABC, and ABC is now admitting that they are biased. CBS has now made some commitments to us that they are going to return to more fact-based journalism.”
Critics from across the political spectrum warn that these developments threaten the foundations of American democracy. Francis Fukuyama, writing in Persuasion, compared the Ellison family’s media strategy to Silvio Berlusconi’s takeover of Mediaset in Italy or Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. The concern is not just about political ambitions, but about the outsized influence that a handful of wealthy individuals can wield over national elections and public opinion.
Some scholars, like Stanford’s Larry Diamond, see Trump’s moves as an attempt to create a "Hungarian-style pseudo-democracy," where one party rules indefinitely through dominance of the media and civil society. Others, like Dartmouth’s Sean Westwood, acknowledge that both left and right have contributed to a culture of speech control, but warn that current trends are escalating into an outright assault on the infrastructure of dissent.
Supporters of the merger argue that it could lead to lower streaming prices and more efficient content delivery. But as media giants consolidate and political pressures mount, the risk is that the very institutions meant to inform, entertain, and hold the powerful accountable could become tools of partisan influence. As the Trump administration continues to wield regulation and financial leverage, the future of American media—and the diversity of voices within it—hangs in the balance.
As the dust settles on this latest chapter in the battle for media control, Americans face an urgent question: Will the nation’s media remain a watchdog, or become a mouthpiece? The answer may shape not only what we watch, but how we understand the world around us.
