President Donald Trump spoke for “nearly an hour” at Paramount CEO David Ellison’s private Washington, D.C. dinner held in his honor on Thursday — all to an audience that included CBS News figures like editor-in-chief Bari Weiss and former evening news anchor Norah O’Donnell, according to The New York Times.
Of the closed-door event, the Times reported Friday afternoon that in addition to network leadership, White House officials including Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were also in attendance, citing two unnamed individuals present at the dinner.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche was also at the dinner, per the Times, raising questions of his proximity to Trump and Ellison as the antitrust division of his Justice Department is due to review Paramount’s $111 billion Warner Bros. Discovery acquisition. Paramount’s chief legal officer Makan Delrahim was also present for the event, seated with Trump.
The D.C. gathering was held at the U.S. Institute of Peace two days before the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday — and the same day that Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders approved the company’s acquisition by Ellison’s Paramount. The deal is now subject to federal review as a growing number of Hollywood stakeholders sound the alarm and call on attorneys general to block it over anti-competition concerns.
TheWrap reported Thursday that Trump was expected to attend the dinner, which touted on its invitation that it was “honoring the Trump White House.”
Word of the dinner first broke last week, when it was reported that the Thursday meal would be held at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace — which the State Department renamed after the president last year— and meant to honor the president and CBS News’ White House reporters.
