David Ellison held an event at the at the U.S. Institute of Peace on Thursday in honor of Donald Trump, where the president reportedly spoke to guests for nearly an hour.
According to a Friday report by The Times, CBS News executives and journalists were in attendance, including Bari Weiss and Norah O’Donnell. The acting attorney general Todd Blanche was also present; the Justice Department, which Blanche oversees, still has to approve Paramount‘s $110 billion megadeal for Warner Bros. Discovery.
Invitations for Thursday’s event, that were given out by Paramount and named Ellison as host, described the night as “honoring the Trump White House.”
WBD shareholders approved Ellison’s impending Paramount merger on Tuesday, inching the deal closer to being completed.
Trump gave remarks at the dinner for almost an hour, The Times reported, where Paramount’s chief legal officer Makan Delrahim; Secretary of State Marco Rubio; and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller were all also in attendance.
Anonymous CBS News journalists told The Times they were “taken aback” by the dinner, and worried it could send a message of “coziness” between the newsroom and the Trump administration.
The event came a few days before Saturday’s White House Correspondents Dinner, which Trump will attend. CBS News, which is backed by Paramount, is planning to bring Secretary Pete Hegseth to the dinner.
Also on Saturday night, the Wall Street Journal will accept the Katharine Graham Award for Courage and Accountability, which “recognizes an individual or news gathering team for coverage of subjects and events of significant national or regional importance in line with the human and professional qualities exemplified by the late Katharine Graham.”
The piece that was recognized was published on July 17, entitled “Jeffrey Epstein’s Friends Sent Him Bawdy Letters for a 50th Birthday Album. One Was From Donald Trump.” It is notably the report that led Trump to file a defamation lawsuit against Wall Street Journal owner News Corp., which detailed a 2003 letter from him to Jeffrey Epstein in which he wrote that they share a “wonderful secret.”
A Florida federal judge dismissed the suit in April. U.S. District Judge Darrin P. Gayles wrote in the order dismissing the lawsuit that Trump’s legal team failed to argue that the article was published by those named in the complaint with malicious intent.
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