On July 2nd, Paramount agreed to settle a baseless lawsuit introduced towards 60 Minutes and CBS Information by President Trump for $16 million. On July 15, throughout a daily present of The Late Present with Stephen Colbert, Colbert went on-air and known as the settlement a “huge fats bribe” in alternate for a positive choice on the proposed merger between Paramount and Skydance, a cost at present beneath investigation in California.
Lower than 48 hours later, on July 17, Paramount canceled The Late Present with Stephen Colbert, a present at present performing first in its timeslot, giving imprecise references to this system’s “monetary efficiency” as the one rationalization. For ten years, the present has been some of the profitable, beloved and worthwhile applications on CBS, entertaining an viewers of hundreds of thousands on late night time tv, on streaming providers and throughout social media.
Given Paramount’s current capitulation to President Trump within the CBS Information lawsuit, the Writers Guild of America has vital issues that The Late Present’s cancelation is a bribe, sacrificing free speech to curry favor with the Trump Administration as the corporate appears to be like for merger approval
Cancelations are a part of the enterprise, however a company terminating a present in dangerous religion resulting from specific or implicit political stress is harmful and unacceptable in a democratic society. Paramount’s choice comes towards a backdrop of relentless assaults on a free press by President Trump, by lawsuits towards CBS and ABC, threatened litigation of media organizations with essential protection, and the unconscionable defunding of PBS and NPR.
The Writers Guild of America calls on New York State Lawyer Basic Letitia James, no stranger to prosecuting Trump for unlawful enterprise practices, to hitch California and launch an investigation into potential wrongdoing at Paramount. We name on our elected leaders to carry these accountable to account, to demand solutions about why this beloved program was canceled and to guarantee the general public that Colbert and his writers weren’t censored resulting from their views or the whims of the President.
Within the meantime, the Writers Guild of America will help our members at The Late Present with Stephen Colbert and throughout the late-night trade as they converse fact to energy and we’ll discover all potential authorized and political avenues to battle for our members within the aftermath of this choice.
