12 Blue States Defy DOJ and Sue to Stop Paramount-Warner Bros. Merger

Twelve Democratic-led states on Monday sued to stop Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, arguing that a merger of two of the country’s largest media companies would hurt American consumers.

The attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, and Washington joined together to file the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. The lawsuit argues that the merger will hurt the market for film distribution and give the new company too much power over the market for distributing basic cable channels.

“The unlawful merger of these two entertainment behemoths would lead to higher prices, lower quality, and less content for film and television, harming movie theaters, basic cable distributors, and ultimately, audiences on every sofa and movie theater seat in the U.S.,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement.

If Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. is successful, the company would own two major news networks in CNN and CBS News, the movie studio Warner Bros., and the streaming service HBO Max. Larry Ellison and his son David Ellison, staunch supporters of President Trump, own Paramount Skydance, and would effectively have their own conservative media empire.

The merger has also raised concerns that CNN would be overhauled to reflect the conservative political views of the Ellisons. The two Trump allies have already steered Paramount’s CBS News to the right, causing its ratings to plummet and, in the process, an employee exodus from its flagship 60 Minutes program.

Trump is very much in favor of the merger, holding a longtime vendetta against CNN over its critical coverage of him, and has discussed who he wants to be fired at the network once the takeover is complete. Other officials in the Trump administration, such as Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, have openly cheered on pro-Trump changes at CNN.

The Department of Justice said last month that it would not challenge Paramount’s move, saying it was “not likely to harm competition or American consumers.” Now that decision will go to federal court, where a judge will determine if the damage to the public breaks the law.

A federal judge just nixed the settlement underlying Donald Trump’s nearly $1.8 billion slush fund.

The fund was the result of an unprecedented deal that Trump made with himself after he dropped his $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service for the unlawful leak of his tax returns in 2019. The honey pot payments were pitched as reparations, paid for by U.S. taxpayers through the Department of Justice, to virtually any right-winger that felt targeted by the previous presidential administration.

“The nature of the suit itself and the conduct of the Parties and counsel from its filing make plain that this was an attempt to use the Court to provide some legitimacy to an agreement to confer immunity to people and entities affiliated with the President and to earmark billions of dollars from American taxpayers to redress grievances not defined in the law,” wrote U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams in a 56-page order Monday.

Williams ruled that any entities affiliated with the slush fund settlement—including the president, the Treasury Department, and the IRS—were “prohibited” from using the details of the arrangement in any official capacity. She also referred Trump’s attorney, Alejandro Brito, to the Florida bar for possible professional discipline.

She noted that while Trump had the right to pursue legal action over the unauthorized publication of his tax returns, he chose not to do so while he was still a private citizen. Instead, Trump did not bring the charges until he had returned to the White House and subsequently appointed his former lawyer, Todd Blanche, atop the Justice Department.

“These officials then negotiated on behalf of the United States, with his current lawyers, including his former White House Counsel, to reach a ‘settlement,’” Williams assessed. “It is risible to suggest that there was ever adverseness between the Parties.”

The settlement between Trump and his government also included a curious addendum from Blanche that immunized Trump from further federal prosecution. The government of the United States, Blanche wrote, would be “forever barred and precluded” from pursuing “any and all claims” against Trump, his family, or his business.

But as Williams observed, the jaw-dropping components of the case—such as the billions of dollars in taxpayer funds proposed for undefined grievances, or the blanket immunities offered to Trump—were not put before the court. Instead, the question underlying the legality of the president’s slush fund centered around whether the entities engaged in the settlement arrangement, from government representatives to Trump’s personal attorneys, ever represented different parties while they pretended to engage in a legitimate court proceeding.

“The answer is a resounding ‘no’: the Lead Plaintiff and the Government are one, a fully realized unitary interest,” Williams wrote.

That was evidenced before the nation in June, when Blanche testified before the House of Representatives that the Anti-Weaponization Fund would not be moving forward. That slip of the tongue showcased Blanche’s confidence that he could speak for, and bind, both sides of the matter, according to the judge.

“In sum, the facts before this Court demonstrate there was never adverseness between the Parties; there was never a case or controversy; and there was never a question as to who would prevail,” Williams concluded.

This story has been updated.

In the latest instance of Donald Trump’s family lining their pockets during his time in the White House, the president’s sons are cashing in on the administration’s military spending strategy with investments in defense technology.

A new analysis from The Washington Post found that investment funds associated with Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump have “invested in more than a dozen defense tech companies and other firms seeking businesses from the Pentagon and federal agencies.”

Since the brothers’ investments, those firms have secured at least $3.2 billion in federal contracts in total, as well as $3.1 billion in future contract options. Some have even gained entry to exclusive preapproved contractor shortlists and, with that, the opportunity to “bid exclusively on up to nearly $200 billion in future work.”

The companies are benefiting from a ramped-up approach to military spending, which started under Joe Biden but escalated significantly under Trump, reports the Post.

Unsurprisingly, in statements to the newspaper, spokespeople for the administration, the Trump brothers, and the defense contractors have dismissed the plain conflict-of-interest concerns raised by the story. They insist that the contracts have been awarded solely on merit and that there is no corruption afoot.

Far-right conspiracy theorists still aren’t convinced that Mitch McConnell is alive.

The Kentucky senator hasn’t been seen since June 14, when he was found unconscious in his Washington residence. For weeks, McConnell’s office has refused to provide a clear explanation regarding his absence, offering scant details regarding the 84-year-old Republican’s hospitalization.

The media blackout ended on Sunday, when McConnell’s office shared a photo of the lawmaker beside his wife, holding a copy of The Washington Post’s Sunday sports section in his lap.

“My doctors have confirmed that I didn’t break any bones or suffer a concussion. I didn’t have a heart attack or a stroke,” McConnell purportedly said in a statement released by his office. “I don’t have any tumors or hemorrhages. But I was briefly unconscious and was taken to the hospital. While receiving excellent care over the past several weeks, I’ve also had to deal with a mild case of pneumonia.”

He added that he’s since been moved to a rehabilitation facility, and while he isn’t “able to return to the Senate floor to vote quite yet,” he is still “working closely” with legislative staff.

But some figures on the far right were still not satisfied by the update, openly speculating that something was gravely wrong with McConnell.

“How come Mitch McConnell’s staff won’t release a video of him? A photo could have been taken at any time. I call BS. The American people aren’t stupid,” wrote political influencer and Trump loyalist Laura Loomer.

In a string of social media posts, Loomer further claimed that there’s “no way Mitch McConnell wrote that essay,” and questioned whether the newspaper in the photograph had been AI-generated, despite the fact that the pictured stories accurately represented the Post’s Sunday coverage.

“The text is blurry and the tag on his shirt is blurred. Also, if he’s in the hospital, why is there no IV connected to him to monitor his health?” wrote Loomer. “This is such bullshit. His staff are liars.”

Former Utah representative and Fox News contributor Jason Chaffetz also urged McConnell to get on video, writing on X: “Let’s see you say it. A written statement is far different than saying it on camera.”

Former Fox News producer Kylie Jane Kremer demanded to see the “metadata on the original photo” of McConnell, and argued online that “the public deserves clear, direct proof that Senator McConnell is recovering and able to communicate.”

“A brief, unedited video would put nearly all of these questions to rest,” Kremer said.

Trump last instituted a blockade on the strait in April, after Iran had already closed the vital passageway. The U.S. blockade wasn’t particularly successful back then, considering that Iran had the economic resources to outlast it, and ended with the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding last month.

Over the weekend, Iran targeted U.S. military bases in the Persian Gulf and Jordan, while the U.S. said it had attacked military targets in Iran such as missile sites, air defenses, and coastal radar. Iran says it will not come back to the negotiating table until there is a new ceasefire, although Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi went to Oman on Saturday to speak with regional mediators about the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran’s leader Mojtaba Khamenei called for revenge against the U.S. in an X post on Saturday following last week’s state funeral for his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes at the beginning of the war in February. It remains to be seen if and when tensions will settle down long enough for negotiations to resume.

This story has been updated.