President Donald Trump is showing support for the pending Nexstar–Tegna merger.
Trump took to Truth Social on Saturday where he shared his thoughts on the deal, which is under review by the FCC, writing in favor of the merger that he says “will help knock out the Fake News.”
“We need more competition against THE ENEMY, the Fake News National TV Networks. Letting Good Deals get done like Nexstar – Tegna will help knock out the Fake News because there will be more competition, and at a higher and more sophisticated level,” the president wrote. “Those that are opposed don’t fully understand how good the concept of this Deal is for them, but they will in the future. GET THAT DEAL DONE! PRESIDENT DJT.”
In August, Nexstar and Tegna entered a definitive agreement for a merger, which would see the former company emerge with 265 local TV stations in 44 states and the District of Columbia and 132 of the country’s 210 television DMAs, or Nielsen’s Designated Market Areas. In total, this would cover 80 percent of U.S. TV households.
And while the merger hasn’t been approved yet by the FCC, chairman Brendan Carr reshared Trump’s social media post in support of said deal on Saturday.
“President Trump is exactly right,” Carr wrote on X Saturday. “The national networks like Comcast & Disney have amassed too much power. For years, they’ve been pushing this Hollywood & New York programming all over the country with no real checks.”
The FCC chairman concluded, “Let’s get it done and bring real competition to them.”
Nexstar CEO Perry Sook released a statement in November, where he argued, “Nexstar’s acquisition of TEGNA will provide us with the scale necessary for local journalism to thrive amidst a media landscape that is dominated by Big Tech and the legacy media companies, enabling us to continue not only investing in high-quality journalism and local news, but in serving our local communities in the best possible way.”
“To be clear, in an age of disinformation and political agendas, we are the anti-fake news,” Sook said. “Our news is delivered by trusted, familiar voices — journalists who live in the community — not a chatbot or social media influencers. And yet, we are prohibited from broadcasting trusted local news and programming to hundreds of communities across the country because of antiquated regulatory constraints. In an era where political discourse has turned increasingly polarized and violent, our democracy requires that Americans have easy access to reliable fact-based journalism and community forums to debate the issues of the day safely and respectfully.”
Trump recently weighed in on another major merger currently dominating Hollywood, that of Netflix and Paramount Skydance’s battle to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, telling NBC News‘ Tom Llamas’ that he “shouldn’t be involved” in the fight for the company.
“I haven’t been involved,” Trump said. “I must say, I guess I’m considered to be a very strong president. I’ve been called by both sides. It’s the two sides, but I’ve decided I shouldn’t be involved. The Justice Department will handle it.”
While Netflix announced plans to acquire Warner Bros. for $82 million, Paramount has fought against this, subsequently launching a $108.7 billion hostile offer for the entire company. Warner Bros. subsequently denied Paramount’s offer, which led the David Ellison-led company to file a lawsuit, seeking more information about how they settled on accepting Netflix’s offer.
Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos appeared before the U.S. Senate’s antitrust subcommittee on Tuesday, where he said that the company acquiring Warner Bros. would help save the studio from “deep-pocked tech companies trying to run away with the TV business.”
