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FIRST ON FOX – Paramount Global and CBS agreed on Tuesday to pay President Donald Trump a sum that could reach north of $30 million to settle the president’s election interference lawsuit against the network.
Trump will receive $16 million upfront. This will cover legal fees, costs of the case, and contributions to his future presidential library or charitable causes, to be determined at Trump’s discretion.
There is an anticipation that there will be another allocation in the mid-eight figures set aside for advertisements, public service announcements, or other similar transmissions, in support of conservative causes by the network in the future, Fox News Digital has learned. With these considerations, CBS would pay well in excess of the $15 million ABC paid Trump to settle a defamation lawsuit last year. Current Paramount management disputes the additional allocation.
Sources close to the situation told Fox News Digital that CBS has agreed to update its editorial standards to install a mandatory new rule. Going forward, the network will promptly release full, unedited transcripts of future presidential candidates’ interviews. People involved in the settlement talks have referred to this as the “Trump Rule.”
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“With this record settlement, President Donald J. Trump delivers another win for the American people as he, once again, holds the Fake News media accountable for their wrongdoing and deceit. CBS and Paramount Global realized the strength of this historic case and had no choice but to settle. President Trump will always ensure that no one gets away with lying to the American People as he continues on his singular mission to Make America Great Again,” a spokesperson for Trump’s legal team told Fox News Digital.
Trump was seeking $20 billion in his lawsuit against CBS over its handling of a “60 Minutes” interview last year with then-Vice President Kamala Harris, accusing the network of election interference leading up to the 2024 contest. CBS is not acknowledging any journalistic wrongdoing with the settlement.
“The settlement will include a release of all claims regarding any CBS reporting through the date of the settlement, including the Texas action and the threatened defamation action,” parent company Paramount said in a statement.
The lawsuit alleged CBS News deceitfully edited an exchange Harris had with “60 Minutes” correspondent Bill Whitaker, who asked her why Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasn’t “listening” to the Biden administration. Harris was widely mocked for the “word salad” answer that aired in a preview clip of the interview on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
However, when the same question aired during a primetime special on the network, Harris had a different, more concise response. Critics at the time accused CBS News of deceitfully editing Harris’ “word salad” answer to shield the Democratic nominee from further backlash leading up to Election Day.
The raw transcript and footage released earlier this year by the FCC showed that both sets of Harris’ comments came from the same response, but CBS News had aired only the first half of her response in the “Face the Nation” preview clip and aired the second half during the primetime special.
CBS News had long denied any wrongdoing and stood by the broadcast and its reporting.
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Paramount and Trump’s legal team had agreed to mediation designed to help the sides reach a settlement. It was widely believed that Paramount Global controlling shareholder Shari Redstone wanted to settle the suit ahead of a planned multi-billion-dollar merger with Skydance Media in hopes of preventing potential retribution by Trump’s FCC, which has the authority to halt the transaction.
“This lawsuit is completely separate from, and unrelated to, the Skydance transaction and the FCC approval process. We will abide by the legal process to defend our case,” Paramount said in a previous statement on the Skydance transaction.
Skydance Media CEO David Ellison, who would control CBS after the planned merger, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A Redstone spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump confidently declared the case against CBS a “winner” in April.
“They cheated and defrauded the American People at levels never seen before in the Political Arena. Kamala Harris, during Early Voting and, immediately before Election Day, was asked a question, and gave an answer, that was so bad and incompetent that it would have cost her many of the Votes that she ended up getting,” Trump posted on Truth Social ahead of mediation, going on to accuse the newsmagazine of perpetrating a fraud on the American people.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and eight Democratic colleagues sent a letter to Redstone in May asking her not to settle the lawsuit against CBS News, which they called an “attack on the First Amendment.” They called the potential settlement a “grave mistake” and “a blatant attempt to intimidate the media and those who speak out against him, President Trump.”
The letter also stated “presidents do not get to punish or censor the media for criticizing them” in the United States.
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Earlier this year, FCC Chair Brendan Carr ordered CBS News to hand over the unedited transcript as part of its probe into whether the network violated the FCC’s “news distortion” policy after a complaint was filed. CBS had refused to release the unedited transcript until the FCC got involved.
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Trump’s attorneys amended their lawsuit to include multiple excerpts from the unedited transcript in hopes of bolstering their case that CBS News withheld unflattering exchanges in order to help the Democratic nominee.
The saga emerged as a distraction inside CBS News and longtime “60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens walked away from the job in April because he wasn’t able to make the “independent decisions” needed for the program to thrive. Owens, who had insisted CBS did nothing wrong with the Harris edit, was vehemently against offering any sort of apology to the president.
The settlement does not include a statement of regret. No amount will be paid directly or indirectly to President Trump personally.
Paramount’s annual stockholders meeting is set for Wednesday, July 2 at 9 am E.T.
CBS News President and CEO Wendy McMahon, who is believed to have been against settling with Trump, announced on May 19 that she was stepping down in another stunning move for the embattled company.
“It’s become clear that the company and I do not agree on the path forward. It’s time for me to move on and for this organization to move forward with new leadership,” McMahon told staffers in a memo that was obtained by Fox News Digital.
“60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley previously said a settlement would be “very damaging to CBS, to Paramount, to the reputation of those companies.” Other high-profile CBS journalists, such as Lesley Stahl, were vehemently against a settlement.
“The unanimous view at ‘60 Minutes’ is that there should be no settlement, and no money paid, because the lawsuit is complete bulls—,” one veteran “60 Minutes” producer told Fox News Digital last month.
ABC also settled a defamation lawsuit in December with then-President-elect Trump for $15 million, after anchor George Stephanopoulos repeatedly and incorrectly asserted Trump had been found “liable for rape” in a civil trial last year. ABC additionally paid $1 million for President Trump’s legal fees.
Fox News Digital’s Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
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