{"id":29658,"date":"2026-08-06T09:16:38","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T04:16:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=29658"},"modified":"2026-08-06T09:16:38","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T04:16:38","slug":"judge-dismisses-lawsuit-from-paramount-streaming-subscribers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=29658","title":{"rendered":"Judge Dismisses Lawsuit From Paramount Streaming Subscribers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div class=\"pmc-paywall\">\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tA federal judge on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit from a group of consumers looking to challenge the $111 billion merger between <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/paramount\/\" id=\"auto-tag_paramount\" data-tag=\"paramount\">Paramount<\/a> and Warner Bros.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tJudge Araceli Mart\u00ednez-Olgu\u00edn wrote that the plaintiffs \u2014 <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/film\/news\/paramount-streaming-subscribers-private-antitrust-1236735206\/\">three current Paramount+ subscribers and two prospective subscribers<\/a> \u2014 presented a lack of standing in their suit. She also ruled that the plaintiffs failed to establish \u201ccognizable\u201d economic fallout that would invoke antitrust regulation. However, she has allowed plaintiffs to revise their complaint and refile.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t\u201cThe Complaint contains a boilerplate assertion of competitive harms, such as \u2018lower quality and variety\u2019 and \u2018decreased consumer choice,\u2019 but it fails to allege any facts to plausibly show how those claimed harms have materialized or would materialize,\u201d she wrote. She later added, \u201cPlaintiffs\u2019 standing theory amounts to little more than the assertion that they are consumers who watch television and go to the movies, and therefore a merger between Entertainment companies would injure them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tJudge Mart\u00ednez-Olgu\u00edn will also preside over the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/film\/news\/paramount-warner-bros-rob-bonta-state-ags-sue-blockbusters-1236810931\/\">antitrust cases from a group of 12 state attorneys<\/a> general and the <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/film\/news\/wga-sues-to-block-paramount-warner-bros-discovery-merger-1236810972\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Writers Guild of America<\/a>, which both claim the Paramount-<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/warner-bros\/\" id=\"auto-tag_warner-bros\" data-tag=\"warner-bros\">Warner Bros.<\/a> merger will do irreparable harm to the entertainment industry. Those cases are <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/tv\/news\/paramount-warner-bros-antitrust-trial-date-march-2027-1236827843\/\">set for trial on March 2, 2027.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tParamount-Skydance CEO <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/david-ellison\/\" id=\"auto-tag_david-ellison\" data-tag=\"david-ellison\">David Ellison<\/a> recently published an op-ed in The New York Times, in which he wrote that the reason the state AGs want the merger blocked is not because of consolidation, but because he will control CNN if he\u2019s allowed to scoop up Warner Bros. Ellison\u2019s ties to President Donald Trump, <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2025\/tv\/news\/trump-warner-bros-discovery-deal-sale-of-cnn-1236605943\/\">a long time critic of CNN<\/a>, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/tv\/news\/fired-60-minutes-bari-weiss-events-that-never-happened-1236820264\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">recent troubles with \u201c60 Minutes\u201d<\/a> have made some in Hollywood nervous about the future of the historic news network.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t\u201cI believe this fight is not really about market share,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/tv\/news\/david-ellison-cnn-paramount-warner-bros-trusted-steward-1236827405\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ellison wrote<\/a>. \u201cI believe a plainer worry sits beneath the briefs and the news releases: the news. The issue is whether I can be trusted as a steward of Warner\u2019s CNN.\u201d Ellison, reasserting his goal of an independent CNN, added, \u201cWhen it comes to our news operations, I do not aspire to lead these companies to bend their newsrooms to my views. I believe that news should be based on facts and truth.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A federal judge on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit from a group of consumers looking to challenge the $111 billion merger between Paramount and Warner Bros. Judge Araceli Mart\u00ednez-Olgu\u00edn wrote that the plaintiffs \u2014 three current Paramount+ subscribers and two prospective subscribers \u2014 presented a lack of standing in their suit. She also ruled that the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29659,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/David-Ellison.jpg?crop=0px%2C37px%2C1500px%2C843px&resize=1000%2C563","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29658\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}