President Trump had sued over an interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. The company needs federal approval for a multibillion-dollar sale. The deal is the clearest sign yet that Mr. Trump’s ability to intimidate major American institutions extends to the media industry. Many lawyers had dismissed Mr. Trump’s lawsuit as baseless and believed that CBS would have ultimately prevailed in court, in part because the network did not report anything factually inaccurate, and the First Amendment gives publishers wide leeway to determine how to present information. Some executives at the company viewed the president’s lawsuit as a potential hurdle to completing a multibillion-dollar sale of the company to the Hollywood studio Skydance, which requires the Trump administration’s approval. The size of the settlement, $16 million, is the same sum that ABC News agreed to pay in December to settle a defamation case filed by Mr. Trump against the network and one of its anchors, George Stephanopoulos. Paramount’s board was concerned that paying a higher amount to settle the case could increase the company’s exposure to potential legal actions from shareholders accusing it of bribery. The prospect of being accused of bribery, and perhaps facing legal action because of it, had vexed Paramount’s directors, who had to weigh the corporate benefits of a settlement against the perception that they were greenlighting a deal to secure an unrelated merger.
1272