President Donald Trump said Sunday that a deal struck by Netflix to buy Warner Bros. Discovery “could be a problem” because of the size of the combined market share.
“There’s no question about it,” Trump said, answering questions about the deal and various other topics as he walked the red carpet at the Kennedy Center Honors.
The Republican president said he will be involved in the decision about whether the federal government should approve the $72 billion deal. If approved by regulators, the merger would put two of the world’s biggest streaming services under the same ownership and join Warner’s television and motion picture division, including DC Studios, with Netflix’s vast library and its production arm.
The deal, which could reshape the entertainment industry, has to “go through a process and we’ll see what happens,” Trump said.
“Netflix is a great company. They’ve done a phenomenal job. Ted is a fantastic man,” he said of Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos, noting that they met in the Oval Office last week before the deal was announced Dec. 5. “I have a lot of respect for him but it’s a lot of market share, so we’ll have to see what happens.”
Asked if Netflix should be allowed to buy the Hollywood giant behind “Harry Potter” and HBO Max, the president said, “Well that’s the question.”
“They have a very big market share and when they have Warner Bros., you know, that share goes up a lot so, I don’t know,” he said. “I’ll be involved in that decision, too. But they have a very big market share”
Sarandos made no guarantees at their meeting about the merger if it is approved, Trump said, adding that the CEO is a “great person” who has “done one of the greatest jobs in the history of movies and other things.”
He repeated that a merger would create a “big market share” for the company.
“There’s no question about it. It could be a problem,” Trump said.
—Darlene Superville, Associated Press
Associated Press writer John Carucci contributed to this report.