Viewers who listened in the Paramount+ livestream of UFC Liberty 250 Sunday evening, organized to mark President Trump’The nation’s 80th anniversary as well as the nation’s semi-fiftieth anniversary were treated to the surreal spectacle of mixed martial artists beating each other in a massive cage set up on the grounds. White House lawn. But there was a big blow that escaped them: an advertisement that exploded the $111 billion merger deal between Paramount Skydance and Warner Bros. Discovery.
That’s because Paramount refused to air the ad, according to the Freedom of the Press Foundation, the nonprofit advocacy group that submitted it to air during the event.
The 30 seconds rejected place features Trump calling journalists “enemies of the people” and suggesting that Trump-allied Paramount Chairman and CEO David Ellison might force CNN, Warner Bros.’ flagship news network, to soften its reporting on the president and his administration.
The ad highlighted an April New York Times article about Ellison. organize a private party in honor of Trump as Paramount awaited approval of its takeover plan, which the Justice Department proposed. clear Friday. He also quotes Scott Pelley, the recently fired correspondent for 60 minutes amid a backlash to changes at Paramount-owned CBS News overseen by Ellison and network executive editor Bari Weiss. Pelley alleged that the new executive leadership wanted him to “inject lies and bias” into his reporting in an effort to “curry favor with the Trump administration.”
The FPF ad warns that if the Paramount-WBD deal goes through, CNN journalists could soon face a similar corporate mandatenoting Trump’s support for the acquisition and a comment from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth in March: “The sooner David Ellison takes over this network, the better. (Ellison’s father, Larry Ellison, the billionaire founder of software company Oracle, also supports Trump and played a key role in establishing the family’s media empire, including its controlling stake in Paramount.)
“Let’s stop the censorship of Trump and block this merger,” the ad’s voiceover concludes. An on-screen link to an FPF Web page for sending letters to congressional representatives demanding an investigation into the “Trump-Paramount corruption.” (Disclosure: WIRED Global Editorial Director Katie Drummond is on the FPF Board of Directors.)
“Ellison will not criticize himself, his company, or his friend Trump,” FPF advocacy chief Seth Stern said in a statement regarding the rejected ad. “These antics are bad for press freedom, bad for the public and bad for Paramount – just look at CBS’ recent struggles under Ellison’s leadership,” he continued, alluding to the continued turmoil at the network since Ellison’s Skydance Media completed its acquisition of Paramount last August. “Billionaires who don’t respect the First Amendment should stay out of the news business.”
FPF alleges that Paramount refused to air the commercial due to a conflict of interest. Stern dismissed this justification as hypocritical given the close ties between the media giant, the Ellisons, and Trump, saying that Paramount “apparently sees no conflict of interest in promising the Trump administration editorial concessions in exchange for approving the merger, in hosting fancy dinners in Trump’s honor while he attacks CBS and CNN reporters, or in airing a UFC event that functioned as an hour-long commercial for Donald Trump and Truth Social.”
Neither the White House nor Paramount responded to a request for comment. CNN declined to comment on the matter.
That of David Ellison appearance alongside Trump during Sunday’s UFC event (Paramount has secured exclusive broadcast rights for the sport in a seven-year, $7.7 billion deal last year) felt like a victory lap. But state attorneys general can still continue to block blockbuster acquisition of Warner Bros. by Paramount, and officials in California, New York and other states are is apparently preparing to do just that. Even if this only delays the deal’s completion by several months, the delay could last throughout a crucial midterm election cycle — a time when Trump and his loyalists will need all the positive press they can get.