Congressman Sam Liccardo has urged FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to deny a petition from Paramount Skydance that would permit three Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds and other foreign investors to acquire a 49.5% equity stake in the company following its merger with Warner Bros. Discovery.
The proposed investment would grant Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, and Qatar a combined 38.5% non-voting stake in the company, exceeding the FCC’s statutory 25% foreign ownership threshold. Additional foreign equity investors include “passive limited partner investors” in funds managed by RedBird Capital Partners.
Paramount has defended the arrangement, asserting that it would not result in a transfer of control and that the Ellison family and RedBird Capital Partners would retain the largest equity stake. However, Liccardo disputes this claim, arguing that the “procedural subtlety of restricting these sovereign funds to non-voting equity shares does not resolve this conflict.”
“Paramount characterizes this arrangement as routine passive foreign investment. It cannot gaslight the American public,” Liccardo wrote. “The scale of their ownership alone constitutes more than mere influence; the company’s financial dependence makes it beholden to its largest shareholders. The Commission must not allow a legal technicality to launder what is, in substance, a surrender of American media and infrastructure to the hands of foreign authoritarian regimes.”
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