Senator Elizabeth Warren is sounding the alarm after Paramount Global agreed to pay $16 million to settle Donald Trump’s lawsuit over a “60 Minutes” interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. Warren says the payout raises serious questions about corporate influence and the integrity of journalism.
“With Paramount folding to Donald Trump at the same time the company needs his administration’s approval for its billion-dollar merger, this could be bribery in plain sight,” Warren said Wednesday. “Paramount has refused to provide answers to a congressional inquiry, so I’m calling for a full investigation into whether or not any anti-bribery laws were broken.”
The 2024 lawsuit, which legal scholars widely dismissed as baseless, accused CBS and Paramount of distorting Harris’s interview in violation of a Texas consumer law. Paramount says the $16 million won’t go directly to Trump, but will instead fund his presidential library. Still, Warren isn’t satisfied.
“This settlement exposes a glaring need for rules to restrict donations to sitting presidents’ libraries,” she said. “I will soon introduce new legislation to rein in corruption through presidential library donations.”
Other lawmakers echoed Warren’s concerns. Senator Ron Wyden tweeted, “Paramount just paid Trump a bribe for merger approval.” Senator Bernie Sanders called the settlement “an extremely dangerous precedent” and “a dark day for independent journalism.”
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez also criticized the payout, saying it casts “a long shadow” over the Skydance-Paramount merger currently under FCC review.
Paramount maintains that the lawsuit and the merger are unrelated.
