🎧 ‘Sleep in the Bed They Made’: Bonta Fires Back as Paramount Talks Collapse

So much for détente. California Attorney General Rob Bonta canceled Monday’s planned meeting with Paramount after accusing the company of leaking — and misrepresenting — confidential settlement discussions to the press. “They need to sleep in the bed that they made,” Bonta tells Elaine Low in this bonus episode of Ankler Agenda, blasting Paramount for “playing games” and waging a PR campaign while, he says, losing where it matters: in court.

The rupture comes even as Gov. Gavin Newsom, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and several Hollywood guilds have all voiced varying degrees of support for getting the two sides to the table. Does that growing pressure change Bonta’s thinking? “Not at all,” he says.

But Bonta also makes clear that the door isn’t permanently shut. He says he’s ready to resume negotiations if Paramount stops the leaks and comes back in good faith — and, for the first time, gets unusually specific about what a deal might require. Forget the chatter about CNN: Bonta says the news network “is not our focus” and that resolving the states’ antitrust concerns would require some portion of Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery’s combined cable portfolio to be placed under separate ownership.

Bonta also explains why behavioral remedies are a nonstarter, says he hopes Republican attorneys general may still join the case and dismisses as “meritless” and “silly” a request seeking his correspondence with Mark Ruffalo following backlash over the actor’s criticism of the Paramount deal.