Why is Trump going after Netflix’s Susan Rice?
Deal with Warner Bros. Discovery may be at stake
President Donald Trump is not the sort of old-fashioned Republican who believes businesses should operate unfettered from government interference. Instead, he is now telling Netflix to fire a prominent board member who once worked for the Obama administration.
The streaming giant will “pay the consequences” if it does not fire Susan Rice from its board “immediately,” Trump said on Sunday. Rice was the ambassador to the United Nations during the Obama administration, said Axios. Democrats will not “forgive and forget” companies that bend to Trump, she said in a recent podcast. That earned the president’s ire. Rice has “no talent or skills — purely a political hack!” Trump said on Truth Social.
The controversy comes as Netflix is trying to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) in an $83 billion deal while fending off a rival bid from Trump-friendly Paramount Skydance. Trump does not have “direct authority to kill media deals,” said Axios, but his comments “could still have an impact on investors and regulators” who must approve the Netflix deal.
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Netflix leaders are shrugging off Trump’s demands, said Politico. The bid for WBD “is a business deal. It’s not a political deal,” said CEO Ted Sarandos. That is not entirely true. The Justice Department is already “probing Netflix’s proposed takeover” for antitrust concerns, said Politico.
What did the commentators say?
Trumpism “closely resembles state-run capitalism,” Steve Benen said at MS Now. The president wants a say in “what private companies charge, their profit margins, the salaries of their executives” and even personnel matters. Trump in August called on Intel to fire its CEO, then followed up in September by urging Microsoft to fire an executive who worked in the Biden administration. His new threat against Netflix is not “posturing or hollow rhetoric.” If Trump wants to derail the company’s bid for WBD, “he is in a position to do so.”
The president is demanding Rice be fired “because she exercised her First Amendment right to criticize him,” Marc Elias said at Democracy Docket. Netflix “now has a choice” to make. The company can “stand behind a distinguished board member,” or it can “fire her at the despotic demand of the president.” Netflix should stand with Rice because firing her “would represent a form of institutional surrender with no bottom and no end.” The question now is whether “Netflix has the courage” to make the right choice and demonstrate that “not every pillar of civil society is too weak and too lacking in self-respect to face Trump’s threats with resolve.”
What next?
Warner Bros. Discovery is now “reviewing a sweetened bid” from Paramount Skydance, said Hollywood Reporter. WBD is “still recommending that shareholders vote for the Netflix deal” when it comes to them for an official vote on March 20. But that could change if “regulators get in the game.” Sarandos is working to prevent that: He, said Politico, “will attend meetings at the White House Thursday" to discuss the WBD bid.
