TV News LIES

Paramount's owners were planning to have secured firm control of Hollywood rival Warner Bros. Discovery by the end of this week in a blockbuster deal that has the blessing of President Trump's Justice Department.

A federal judge has instead ground the process to a halt, at least for now. And her ruling on Monday in response to a lawsuit filed a week ago by a dozen states suggests Paramount may have some tough sledding ahead in order to get the deal through.

In the ruling, U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín granted a 14-day temporary restraining order to pause the acquisition. The Democratic attorneys general allege that Paramount's purchase of Warner Bros. would reduce competition, hurting filmgoers along with TV and news consumers and especially those who create entertainment programming and the news content that the public relies on.

The $111 billion deal would put under the same corporate roof Paramount's and Warner's movie and television studios, streamers Paramount+ and HBO Max, Paramount's CBS (the nation's most watched broadcast outlet), and 50 cable TV channels, not to mention both CBS News and CNN.

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Michigan Senate candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed (D) on Sunday ripped into CNN host Jake Tapper for asking him questions related to Iran and Israel — specifically about past comments the candidate has made.

Tapper first asked El-Sayed about a comment New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D) made to The New York Times. When asked if there was room in the Democratic Party for candidates who take money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — the pro-Israel lobbying group — the mayor said, “If they are Democrats and they run as Democrats and they win as Democrats, then they should be part of the Democratic Party.”

Tapper suggested that El-Sayed disagrees based on past remarks, where the candidate told CNN that support for Israel could only be about AIPAC influence and “not if you’re a Democrat and you believe in human rights.”

“So, it sounds as though — and correct me if I’m wrong — it sounds as though you and Mayor Mamdani disagree about how big this tent should be, whether there’s room … in the tent for Israel supporters,” Tapper said.

El-Sayed began saying that in the Democratic Party “there’s always room in the tent for folks.”

“Every time I come on CNN, you guys ask me the same questions about these theoretical rights of existence, or whether or not I agree with the mayor of New York,” El-Sayed said.

“I’m running for Senate in Michigan and, in Michigan, people can’t afford their basic needs. They don’t get the healthcare they need and deserve. They’re worried about the quality of their kids’ school. And the questions seem less to be about the interests of Michiganders than the fact of something happening 6,000 miles away,” he added.

Referring to Mamdani’s comment to the Times, El-Sayed only said that he thinks his “tax dollar should be spent here.”

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Detroit’s Democratic lawmaker Rashida Tlaib has called for the resignation of Neil Barofsky, the federal monitor tasked with overseeing the United Autoworkers, following reports of a call in which Barofsky hammered UAW President Shawn Fain in 2024 over the union’s call for a ceasefire in Gaza.

Drop Site obtained and authenticated a recording of the conversation, which undercuts previous claims by Barofsky about his interactions with Fain. During a board meeting around the same time, Barofsky claimed, according to previously leaked minutes, that he had never said that the UAW statement crossed a line into antisemitism, but in the call he repeatedly made that claim. Barofsky also claimed he didn’t share his own opinion with Fain on the call, but in fact Barofsky does so at length.

The recording also undercuts Barofsky’s claims about what Fain said during the call. Barofsky claimed that Fain told him he had intended to compare Israel to Nazi Germany, that Fain said he wasn’t interested in hearing other perspectives, and that he said it was “bullshit” that Jews were suffering as a result of rising antisemitism.

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Arturo Gonzalez was in a car scouting for immigration agents in a Home Depot parking lot on a recent morning when he received a tip on his phone: An immigrant worker in a black pickup truck was just pulled over near the public library. Gonzalez, riding in the passenger seat of a 2013 BMW, popped the address into a second cell phone he keeps attached to the dashboard.

Google Maps said they were eight minutes away.

“We might not make it,” he told his driver for the day, Cindy Plaza, as she steered out of the parking lot.

Plaza drove as fast as she could within reason, deploying what Gonzalez likes to call “legal ways to avoid a red light” — frequent turns and U-turns you wouldn’t normally make. When they reached the library, they found the pickup truck, with a roll of carpet strapped to the bed rack. Inside were a lunch cooler, a stack of work orders and the keys to the truck. A woman in the parking lot said the man was gone.

“They took him,” she told Gonzalez.

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A US federal judge this week ruled in favour of a prominent Palestinian-American academic and activist in a decision that deemed the search and seizure of his phones by customs officers to be illegal.

Osama Abu Irshaid, the executive director of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), had his phones taken from him and searched at Washington Dulles International Airport on two occasions in 2024, upon his return from trips to the Middle East. 

On Wednesday, the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia determined that Abu Irshaid was indeed entitled to his Fourth Amendment claim, because "the evidence marshaled by Defendants... does not rise to the level of reasonable suspicion" of ongoing criminal activity, the decision read. 

The Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures and requires that warrants be issued by a judge based on probable cause.

"Not only is this a victory for Dr Abu Irshaid, but a victory for the pro-Palestine movement overall. For decades, allies who support Palestinian human rights have been systematically targeted by the US government for daring to speak out against Apartheid Israel," AMP said in a statement following the ruling.

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More than a thousand people rallied for Justin Pearson, a Democratic state representative running for Congress, in the wake of four fatal shootings by members of the Memphis Safe Task Force over the last two months.

Crowds packed New Direction Christian Church in the city’s Hickory Hill neighborhood in support of Pearson, who is running in the now-fractured ninth congressional district’s Democratic primary.

“Today we are in the fight of our lives to make this district, our state, and this nation better for ourselves and for those who will come after us,” Pearson said.

“If God be for us, it doesn’t matter if every white supremacist in the Tennessee General Assembly is against us, and that nothing can separate us from the love of God that’s found in Christ Jesus. No matter what they call us, no matter where they redline us, no matter how they try and lynch us, no matter what. Grandmama said, “‘If God be for us, it doesn’t matter who or what is against.’”

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