Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos met with Donald Trump at the White House in mid-November to discuss the streamer’s planned bid to purchase Warner Bros., Bloomberg and others reported Sunday, with the president insisting that Warner Bros. should sell to the company offering the most money.
Sarandos reportedly agreed with the president and also insisted Netflix is not “any kind of all-powerful monopoly.” Sarandos also painted Netflix as “the fifth-or sixth-biggest distributor on TV” and argued that the purchase would make the company the size of YouTube in the US.
Netflix did not immediately respond Sunday to a request for comment.
Netflix agreed to pay $82.7 billion for Warner Bros. on Friday, making what would be one of the largest media deals ever, if approved. The deal is far from set, and the streamer’s rival Paramount could still mount an opposing offer. The Ellison family – already well-connected to Trump – reportedly attempted to sway Washington against the Netflix deal.
According to Bloomberg’s report, as early as September Warner Bros. CEO David Zaslav was still resisting the idea of selling. Warner Bros. rejected the first offer from Paramount for being too low. Paramount’s David Ellison insisted to Zaslav he could get the deal approved by Trump, something he felt others (such as Amazon and Apple) would not be able to pull off.
In October, Warner Bros. announced other companies could make offers. At the time Netflix wasn’t seen as a realistic bidder, primarily because executives had not yet ever agreed on what transactions Netflix should pursue.
But the group managed to find common ground when it came to Warner Bros. and began putting together an offer. Netflix’s leadership reportedly met with Warner Bros. execs and “promised to continue releasing Warner Bros. movies in theaters and continue licensing its television shows to third parties” and also “argued Netflix was a better partner than Comcast or Paramount because the company didn’t already own a major studio, and thus wouldn’t fire as many people.”
Sarandos had also been nurturing his own relationship with Trump since late 2024, Bloomberg noted. His wife, Nicole Avant, served as an ambassador to the Bahamas under President Obama, but neither had a strong connection to the Trump administration. Sarandos traveled to Mar-a-Lago, where the pair began to bond. Warner Bros. eventually asked Paramount, Netflix, and Comcast to submit offers on December 1.
Netflix submitted both the highest offer and the highest breakup fee ($5.8 billion). Sarandos was notified Netflix had won the bid on December 4.
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