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Every episode of “South Park” opens with a disclaimer: “All characters and events in this show — even those based on real people — are entirely fictional. All celebrity voices are impersonated … poorly. The following program contains coarse language and due to its content it should not be viewed by anyone.”

While some of that language must be required by an exhausted legal team behind the scenes, the long-running satirical cartoon is known for pressing hot-button topics and rapidly churning out searing parodies. Season 27, which premiered in July, is no exception, focusing on President Trump, his associates, policies and other current events. Some members of Trump’s cabinet have been outspoken about their likeness appearing in “South Park,” but others have shrugged it off. Over the years, the animated series has depicted conservatives and liberals alike, leaving almost no public figure, politician or activist shielded from critique or crude depiction.

This season has had an unusual cadence of episodes, with the first two arriving on a weekly schedule, then biweekly before the arrival of Episode 5, which aired three weeks later on Wednesday. The delayed episode arrived after the shooting death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, whose debate style was depicted in the Episode 2. However, “South Park” creators Matt Parker and Trey Stone told the Denver Post the delay was unrelated to recent events, like Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension, or the content: “No one pulled the episode, no one censored us, and you know we’d say so if true.” The pair had issued a statement on Sept. 17 saying the episode wasn’t finished in time. Future episodes will air every two weeks through Dec. 10.

Here is a guide to every parody and reference so far on this season of “South Park.”

This story will be updated with each new episode.

‘Sermon on the ‘Mount,’ Episode 1

Cartman in “Sermon on the ‘Mount.”

(Comedy Central)

Cutting funding to the Corp. for Public Broadcasting

Cartman is dismayed to find out National Public Radio has lost its federal funding after he tunes in to hear static — an NPR program is his “favorite show,” he says, where “all the liberals b— and whine about stuff.” He rants to his friends about how the government “can’t cancel a show” and wonders what might be next on the chopping block.

In July, the Senate voted to approve the Trump White House’s proposal to claw back roughly $1 billion in federal funding previously allocated for public broadcasting. NPR and PBS are still operating despite the funding cuts, but layoffs and reduced programming are expected.

Christianity in public schools

Head of South Park Elementary PC Principal, whose name was a play on the initialism for politically correct, announces to the school that his name now stands for “Power Christian Principal.” He holds an assembly where he says that “our Lord and savior Jesus Christ” is the only thing that can bring back some normalcy to these “corrupt times.” He proceeds to welcome Jesus to the assembly as a guest speaker. When the students go back home, their parents and the people of South Park are alarmed to hear about the emphasis on Christianity — and the presence of Jesus — in the town’s public school.

Trump has previously endorsed displaying the Ten Commandments in classrooms amid a push to incorporate more Christianity into public schools.

‘Woke is dead’

The phrase frequently used by Trump was inscribed on a T-shirt Cartman wears after he realizes the concept of “wokeness” is no longer prominent. “Everyone hates the Jews, everyone’s fine with using gay slurs,” he says, lamenting that he no longer feels purpose if there’s no wokeness to contest.

Karoline Leavitt

The White House press secretary is depicted corralling the president, sporting a large cross necklace, as she often does during press briefings. Leavitt tells Trump a lot of his supporters are starting to turn against him and begs him to talk to them, adding that they’re “really riled up.” Trump’s base has expressed frustration over the administration’s approach to sharing information about the Jeffery Epstein case after he promised more transparency about the convicted sex offender, who died by suicide in 2019, and the sex trafficking investigation involving the late financier.

President Trump

Trump appears this season with an image of his face over an animated body, frequently repeating the phrase “Relax, guy” and threatening lawsuits against anyone who’s in his way. He is shown berating a White House portrait painter for an unflattering depiction of him and there are references to the size of the president’s genitalia. He’s also depicted as being in an abusive relationship with Satan — in which Trump is the abuser. “South Park” has previously depicted Satan as being the victim in an abusive relationship with Saddam Hussein.

The Epstein list

Satan laments the speculation that Trump’s name is on the “Epstein list,” a purported list of his alleged clients. In reality, the Justice Department has said no such list exists, walking back comments Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi made in a Fox News interview earlier this year that the list was “sitting on my desk” in preparation for release. When the list is brought up in the series, fictional Trump says, “Are we still talking about that?,” mirroring comments he made in real life.

CBS’ ’60 Minutes’ and Paramount drama

The stopwatch featured in the introduction to “60 Minutes” is strapped to a bomb when it appears on “South Park.” The hosts of the show are visibly nervous and continue praising the president while covering his lawsuit against the town of South Park, adding that they don’t agree with Trump’s detractors.

The scene references the legal tussle between Trump and Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS, which airs “60 Minutes.” The president sued over edits to a “60 Minutes” interview with then-Vice President Kamala Harris, which led to Paramount agreeing to pay $16 million to settle the lawsuit in July; shortly after, the Federal Communications Commission, led by a Trump appointee, approved Paramount’s merger with Skydance.

Between the settlement and merger approval, CBS announced it is canceling “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.” Colbert frequently skewers the president on his show, and Trump praised the cancellation. Paramount also recently bought the global streaming rights to “South Park” in a lucrative $1.5-billion deal for Parker and Stone.

During the episode’s fictitious “60 Minutes” segment over Trump’s lawsuit against the town, Jesus comes to visit the townspeople. Through whispers, he tells them, “I didn’t want to come back and be in the school, but I had to because it was part of a lawsuit and the agreement with Paramount.”

“The president’s suing you?” a protester asks.

Jesus, through clenched teeth, explains: “The guy can do what he wants now that someone backed down. … You guys saw what happened to CBS? Well, guess who owns CBS? Paramount! You really want to end up like Colbert? You guys gotta stop being stupid. … If someone has the power of the presidency and also has the power to sue and take bribes, then he can do anything to anyone.”

“All of you, shut the f— up or South Park is over!” Jesus says.

The people of South Park end up settling their lawsuit with the president for $3.5 million, saying it will be fine as long as they cut some funding for their schools, hospitals and roads. And as part of the settlement, they have to agree to “pro-Trump messaging.” Cut to a live-action deepfake video of Trump trekking through the desert in a show of loyalty to his supporters before he strips naked.

‘Got a Nut,’ Episode 2

Cartman becomes a podcaster in Episode 2.

(Comedy Central)

Note: This episode aired on Aug. 6, more than a month before political commentator Charlie Kirk, who is parodied throughout the episode, was shot and killed.

ICE recruitment and immigration raids

This episode is focused on the ongoing raids carried out across the country by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Department of Homeland Security officials since earlier this year.

When South Park Elementary counselor Mr. Mackey is fired — the government is doing away with needless spending in schools, he’s told — he signs up for a job with ICE, enticed by a generous signing bonus and a higher salary. Mackey watches a promotional video, complete with animations of officers wearing gaiters and a theme song: “We don’t ask for experience, just show up / We don’t care if you’ve read a book or grown up / If you’re crazy or fat and lazy, we don’t care at all … If you need a job, it’s a job to have.”

Mackey is hired with alarming speed and proceeds to go on his first raid, targeting a “Dora the Explorer” live show, which has a not-so-intimidating audience of young children and abuelitas. After ICE agents hear from protesters that there are “many Latinos in heaven,” they make the pearly gates their next stop.

Kristi Noem

The Department of Homeland Security secretary leads ICE agents through a series of raids this episode, but she first appears in an orientation video. She tells the new recruits, “A few years ago, I had to put my puppy down by shooting it in the face because sometimes doing what’s important means doing what’s hard,” and she proceeds to going on a shooting spree targeting yelping puppies (including Krypto the Superdog) throughout the episode. In her 2024 book, Noem wrote about how she killed her 14-month-old dog for exhibiting aggressive behavior.

She’s also seen rounding up as many immigrants as possible in raids, shouting orders like, “If it’s brown, it goes down.”

And in a running gag, her face periodically melts off, requiring a glam squad equivalent to a pit crew, and at one point, it seems to take on a life of its own. Trump also says her face “freaks me out” during the episode.

Noem responded to the depiction on Glenn Beck’s podcast, calling it “lazy” to target her looks. “If they wanted to criticize my job, go ahead and do that, but clearly they can’t, they just pick something petty like that,” she said.

Right-wing debate podcasts

While conservative political commentator Charlie Kirk does not appear as a character in this episode, his style of debate content — and his name — are featured.

Loudmouthed Cartman is frustrated that so many others, namely his classmate Clyde Donovan, are profiting off of “his shtick” of arguing against liberal views.

Clyde has a debate podcast, inviting viewers to watch as he “totally destroys these woke liberal students.” He’s set up in a tent on a college campus where he waits as a line of students come to speak with him, and he challenges them to “prove me wrong.” Cartman eventually takes over, saying that he is the “master debater” and sporting a haircut similar to Kirk’s. He shuts down his opponents’ arguments with phrases like, “You just hate America and you love abortions.”

Clyde and Cartman’s content replicates Kirk’s well-known style. The founder of the conservative organization Turning Point USA frequently toured college campuses and hosted events just like the one depicted in the episode. The phrase “prove me wrong” was used frequently by Kirk to promote his events, inviting students to challenge his political and cultural views.

On Sept. 10, Kirk was shot and killed while hosting such an event at Utah Valley University, the first stop of his “American Comeback” tour. Weeks before he was killed, Kirk responded to the episode with a 30-minute YouTube video, finding it humorous.

“I think a lot of it was hilarious towards me,” he said. “Some of it was very funny and I don’t think we should have too thick of skin.”

He also touched on the reach of his organization and events, noting that his name is enshrined in “The Charlie Kirk Award for Young Masterdebaters” that Cartman and Clyde compete for in the episode. “So a campus thing I’ve been doing for 13 years to debate random college kids has now been so important that it gets prominent prime-time placement on Comedy Central?” he asked through laughs. “I think the whole thing is just awesome and hilarious.”

Mar-a-Lago

When Mr. Mackey is rewarded for good work as an ICE agent, he’s flown to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, where he frequently stays and hosts events.

He’s greeted by giggling women who hand him a drink and put flower leis around his neck before the president meets him and gives him a brief tour of Mar-a-Lago. While there, Mackey accidentally walks in on two older men receiving massages from younger women, one of whom is a tearful Dora, detained in the raid that took place earlier in the episode. The scene is likely a reference to Epstein and accounts from survivors who say they were forced to give massages to him and his associates. Trump said this summer that Epstein “stole” young women who worked at the Mar-a-Lago spa, which caused them to have a falling-out.

JD Vance

The vice president is depicted as a version of Tattoo, the character from late-’70s drama “Fantasy Island,” and is animated similarly as Trump, except the photo used for his face is lifted directly from viral memes. He often does the president’s bidding, calling him “boss.” In turn, Trump frequently calls Vance “stupid.” Acknowledging the caricature, Vance wrote on X, “Well, I’ve finally made it.”

‘Sickofancy,’ Episode 3

Randy begins microdosing ketamine and Towelie goes to Washington, D.C., in this episode.

(Comedy Central)

Immigration raid at cannabis farm

Randy’s hemp farm business, Tegridy Farms, is the site of an immigration raid at the the beginning of this episode. While Randy is shooting a commercial, complete with calming guitar music and a trite script, ICE officers interrupt by detaining almost all the workers. “You sons of b—,” Randy screams after the vans as they drive away. “Those are my Mexicans!”

In July, chaotic raids targeting a cannabis company’s growing site and greenhouse in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties drew national attention after a man who was fleeing immigration officials died.

Microdosing ketamine

With his business in shambles, Randy rethinks his strategy with the help of an over-complimentary AI chatbot. Perhaps in a nod to Trump’s former ally and onetime “special government employee” Elon Musk, the billionaire businessman behind Tesla, SpaceX and X, Randy turns to ketamine. Randy insists a slew of “tech guys” are taking small doses of ketamine and the drug “gives their minds the edge to work with AI.” Ketamine “bolsters our focus and creativity,” he tells his partner Towelie. Under the influence of the drug, Randy transforms Tegridy Farms from a “quaint farm” into an “AI-powered marijuana platform for global solutions.”

Musk’s use of ketamine and other drugs has been previously reported, with the tech leader saying in a 2024 interview that ketamine has been prescribed to him and is “helpful for getting one out of a negative frame of mind.” He has denied abusing it. “If you use too much ketamine, you can’t really get work done. I have a lot of work, I’m typically putting in 16-hour days,” he said. “So I don’t really have a situation where I can be not mentally acute for an extended period of time.”

Musk supported Trump’s campaign and served as an advisor to the president, helming the Department of Government Efficiency earlier this year with the goal of slashing spending.

Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook

Meta and Apple chief executives Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook, who were both present at Trump’s inauguration and have maintained friendly relationships with him, are both portrayed in this episode as members of a long line outside of the Oval Office waiting to bestow a gift on the president.

“Mr. President, your ideas for the tech industry are so innovative,” Cook says to Trump. Cook gives the president a gift on behalf of Apple, which actually happened this summer. Zuckerberg is later seen giving the president a gift that appears to be a gold and bejeweled Meta virtual reality headset.

Luxury jet from Qatar

Qatar’s leader is also seen in line holding a model gold plane with a tag that says “Air Force One.” Like everyone else, the leader compliments the president and insists his genitalia is not small before giving him the gift. Trump and the Defense Department accepted a luxury Boeing 747 aircraft from Qatar for President Trump to use as Air Force One this summer, despite ongoing questions about the ethics and legality of taking the expensive gift from a foreign nation.

Washington, D.C.

When Towelie takes a trip to the capital in this episode, he sees armed troops guarding monuments like the Washington and Lincoln memorials and the Capitol surrounded by tanks and jets. In the episode, the Lincoln Memorial has been replaced by a statue of a stern-faced Trump with exposed genitalia.

In August, Trump called up National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., to assist federal law enforcement in his bid to “reestablish law and order” by targeting criminals — though crime has been down in the city — and the homeless. Although troops were not initially armed, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth later ordered them to carry service-issued weapons.

Reclassifying marijuana

Randy sends Towelie to meet with Trump and give him a gift in hopes of persuading him to reclassify marijuana on the national level. (The gift is Towelie himself.) Randy, in the form of a hologram, tells Trump he thinks they can work out a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Trump said in an August press conference that his administration was considering reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug, which would be a significant change in policy but would not make the drug legal across the country.

‘Wok is Dead,’ Episode 4

Butters buys a Labubu for his girlfriend.

(Comedy Central)

Tariffs and Labubus

The clerk at the City Pop-Up — rebranded from City Wok — the lone purveyor of Labubus in the area, says the popular dolls are hard to keep in stock, and they’re very expensive because of tariffs. The “mystery box” that Butters has to purchase for the chance of getting the exact Labubu his girlfriend wants sets him back $85, and later, the price shoots up to $120 to offset a rise in tariffs. (The real-life dolls often fetch much more than that on resale sites, especially if they are rare.) When Butters balks at the price, the store owner explains that the cost of tariffs is passed onto the customer.

Fox News

This episode shows a clip from a Fox News segment where an anchor is overly complimentary of the president. The anchor says the president will take questions from a “diverse crowd of reporters” after returning to the U.S. from a historic tariff summit, only to reveal all of the reporters are from Fox.

The Fox News reporters also fixate on President Trump’s relationship with his wife, Melania, and his increasingly frequent appearances with Satan. There’s a heavy use of wordplay that suggests the anchors could be asking about the affair between the president and Satan or about whether Trump is actually the devil himself.

Kid Rock

Fox News reporters check in with Trump ally Kid Rock after breaking the news that — buckle up — Trump has impregnated Satan. A sobbing Kid Rock tells the reporters, “I’m just so happy.” The musician is a friend and ardent supporter of Trump, having performed at his inaugural rally in January and spoken many times publicly about his support of the president.

‘Conflict of Interest,’ Episode 5

South Park Season 27, Episode 5 “Conflict of Interest”

(Comedy Central)

Israel and Gaza

Kyle becomes irate when his classmates place bets on a popular market prediction app that his mother would “strike Gaza and destroy a Palestinian hospital.”

This episode marks the first time this season that the show has touched on the current conflict in Gaza, and it referenced real-life Israeli strikes on hospitals in the area.

Donald Trump Jr.

Trump’s eldest son appears in this episode as someone with many roles — he’s a strategic advisor for predictive markets, he answers the phone for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and also acts as a special advisor to Israel. Although he wears all those hats, the series doesn’t portray him as particularly bright — he has a complete conversation over the phone with himself.

He’s also animated to look as if he’s had extensive plastic surgery and he speaks with a strained voice, as if he can’t move his face.

Trump Jr. holds several key roles in his family’s business and his father’s political sphere in real life, and he serves as an advisor to both Polymart and Kalshi, two prediction market apps that are named and spoofed in this episode.

Trump’s stance on abortion

Less keen on the baby he’s expecting with Satan, Trump looks for different ways to harm the pregnancy in hopes of terminating it. He asks Satan if he wants to smoke and hang out in a hot tub, holds up a wire hanger, tries to get him to trip down the stairs or fall under a pile of cat feces, and even makes Satan a soup full of emergency contraceptive pills.

In reality, Trump has repeatedly shifted his messaging on abortion but has most recently said he believes specific abortion policies and access should be decided not by federal law but by individual states.

Brendan Carr

The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission comes into the fold this episode when Kyle goes through several hoops to try to file a complaint over the bet involving his mom, which he finds offensive. The FCC is “dealing with all the offensive stuff now,” Kyle is told.

Carr says he needs to speak with the president after learning about the offensive content, but he ends up falling victim to all of Trump’s antics in his attempt to terminate Satan’s pregnancy, which send him to the hospital. The doctors say they’re “afraid he may lose his freedom of speech.”

Vance later threatens Carr, who keeps interfering with Trump’s attempts to end Satan’s pregnancy (Vance doesn’t want anything to mess with his proximity to the presidency). “We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way,” Vance says to Carr.

Those words match the phrase Carr said in real life a week before this episode aired in reference to his call on ABC to act on comments late-night host Jimmy Kimmel made about Kirk’s suspected killer and his death. Carr has remained in the headlines since then as backlash grew against the FCC’s role in Kimmel’s suspension.

Benjamin Netanyahu

Frustrated by the bet about her and the ongoing conflict in Gaza, Kyle’s mom storms into the office of the Israeli prime minister. “Just who do you think you are, killing thousands and flattening neighborhoods, then wrapping yourself in Judaism like it’s some shield from criticism?” she says. “You’re making life for Jews miserable and life for American Jews impossible.” She continues to berate him and a group of officials while the credits roll. Netanyahu does not say anything in response.

Veteran producer Kim Harvey has been tapped to take over the “CBS Evening News,” which has lost viewers since a recent revamp.

The network announced Thursday that Harvey will replace Guy Campanile, a “60 Minutes” producer who joined the program last year.

Campanile, who was brought on by former “60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens when he oversaw recent changes at the newscast, will return to the newsmagazine.

“CBS Evening News” has been struggling to retain viewers since it replaced Norah O’Donnell, who held the anchor chair for five years.

Kim Harvey is the new executive producer of “CBS Evening News.”

(CBS News)

CBS News added John Dickerson and Maurice DuBois as co-anchors and put an emphasis on longer stories closer to the style of “60 Minutes.” But the program has failed to gain any traction against ABC’s “World News Tonight With David Muir” and NBC’s “Nightly News With Tom Llamas.”

Harvey’s appointment is likely a precursor to larger changes at the program, including a possible return to a single anchor and a more traditional approach to the newscast. She was a trusted lieutenant of O’Donnell during her run.

Harvey has been with “CBS Evening News” since 2017, eventually rising to senior broadcast producer. She is thoroughly familiar with the operation that has gone through three anchor changes since she arrived.

“Kim brings a sharp news sense and terrific track record of producing from across the broadcast and cable networks,” CBS News President Tom Cibrowski said in a statement. “She is a well-respected newsroom leader and her relationships with our on-air talent, producers and reporters run deep.”

Harvey’s career includes stints at the three major cable news networks. She started her career as a video journalist at CNN.

She spent several years at Fox News, where she produced “The O’Reilly Factor,” which was the network’s top prime time program before host Bill O’Reilly was ousted over sexual harassment allegations.

At MSNBC, Harvey was part of the team that launched “The Rachel Maddow Show” and “All In with Chris Hayes.”

The future of CBS News has been a subject of much speculation since the network’s parent company Paramount Global was taken over by Skydance Media.

Before the merger closed, Paramount Global agreed to pay $16 million to settle President Trump’s legal salvo against “60 Minutes” over the editing of an interview with his 2024 opponent, then-Vice President Kamala Harris. The lawsuit, considered frivolous by 1st Amendment experts, damaged the morale of the news division and likely led to the ouster of Owens in April.

The new owners have also promised the Federal Communications Commission that it will hire an ombudsman who will report to Paramount’s new president, Jeff Shell.

Actress Gina Carano, Lucasfilm and its parent company Walt Disney Co. have settled the federal lawsuit filed in which Carano claimed that, in 2021, she was wrongfully terminated from her role in “The Mandalorian” after she expressed her conservative political views on social media.

The settlement details have not been made public, but Lucasfilm released a statement praising Carano’s on-set professionalism and expressing the hope of “identifying opportunities to work together with Ms. Carano in the near future.”

I am here to beg everyone to remain calm and avoid using the four Cs: cancel culture (is this the end of it?) and corporate capitulation (is this another example of it?)

No and no.

Cancel culture has long been an amorphous and often recklessly applied term, used to describe a litany of events, including but certainly not limited to male predators losing their jobs, students protesting their school’s choice of graduation speakers and outrage over J.K. Rowling’s stance on transgender women.

Recently, however, it has taken a far more concrete shape that looks astonishingly like the White House where President Trump continues to literally cancel all manner of things, including U.S. membership in the World Health Organization, the regulatory power of the Environmental Protection Agency and huge portions of Medicaid. Recently, he fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics after the bureau documented weaker than expected numbers for July and downward revisions for the previous two months.

Corporate capitulation, too, is alive and well, with law firms, universities and media companies falling like dominoes before Trump’s lawsuits and threats of defunding. Last year, Trump sued ABC and its parent company Disney for defamation after anchor George Stephanopoulos wrongly stated on air that Trump had been found civilly liable for raping E. Jean Carroll — Trump had been found civilly liable of sexually assaulting and defaming Carroll. Disney settled for $15 million, paid to Trump’s presidential foundation and museum.

Even more troubling was Paramount Global’s decision to pay a $16-million settlement in what many consider a frivolous lawsuit brought by Trump against “60 Minutes.” After late-night host Stephen Colbert called the move a “big fat bribe” designed to ensure Paramount’s recent acquisition by Skydance, CBS, which is owned by Paramount, announced that “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” was being canceled due to financial considerations.

So while it is tempting to see Disney settling with Carano as a piece of a larger and very worrisome whole, particularly when Elon Musk financed her lawsuit, it was in fact simply the right thing to do.

Carano is a former mixed martial artist turned actor who has been vocal about her support for conservative causes and President Trump. In 2020, she had caught some flack for posting “beep/bop/boop” as her pronouns in her Twitter bio, which some took as her way of mocking trans people. She denied this, changed her bio and expressed support for the trans community.

There were also posts that criticized masking policies and shutdowns during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as one calling for an investigation into voter fraud after the 2020 election.

But it was a repost on Instagram that cost her her job — in February 2021, she reposted a famously horrific image of a half-naked Jewish woman fleeing from a mob with a moronically simplistic message about divisive politics: “Most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?”

Landing just a month after then-President Trump sent an armed mob to attack the Capitol in the hopes of overturning an election he refused to believe he had lost, the post, which appeared to compare MAGA supporters in 2021 America with Jews in Nazi Germany, sparked #FireGinaCarano.

And that’s exactly what Disney did. Calling her posts “abhorrent and unacceptable,” Lucasfilm excised her character from “The Mandalorian” and canceled an upcoming spinoff in which she was to star. Her talent agency, UTA, dropped her and Hasbro canceled a line of toys based on her “Mandalorian” character.

It was an overreaction that smacked of fear and pandering. I do not agree with the sentiments Carano expressed in her posts, but compared with the blithely toxic abuse regularly used on social media, they are relatively benign, based far more on genuine ignorance — most people are in fact aware of the vicious antisemitism leveraged by the Nazis as well as their institutionalized tactics of fear — than anything else.

Of course, those who attempt to be politically provocative on social media (and reposting a photo of a victimized Jewish woman in such context is the definition of political provocation) cannot then feign shock and dismay when people are provoked, especially at a time when far-right tweets, including the president’s, had led to a violent attack against lawmakers. (Hence the irony of Musk’s support — the platform he renamed X was in large part built on its ability to harness all manner of just and unjust hashtag campaigns.)

But as my colleague Robin Abcarian noted when Carano filed her lawsuit in 2023, the social media mob’s decision that a woman, who was far from a household name, deserved to lose her livelihood, and more important, Lucasfilm’s agreement with that decision, was extreme.

Bad publicity is never good for an entertainment property and whether it was explicit in her contract or not, Carano did represent, to a certain extent, “The Mandalorian,” Lucasfilm and Disney. Unfortunately, the entertainment industry’s increasing reliance on social media has created a world in which actors and other creative types are expected to amass millions of followers on platforms that tend to reward the outspoken and outrageous over the thoughtful. Encouraged to reveal themselves “authentically,” stars can find themselves prodded by fans to comment on current events and excoriated when they refuse or respond in a way that certain followers consider insincere or politically incorrect.

Telling people to stay off social media is not the answer; neither is regulation by hashtag campaign.

While Carano’s case is certainly reflective of many perils that face us at the moment, the fact that she reached a settlement, including an apparent promise of more work, is not a sign of further deterioration.

The fear that our cultural landscape is being attacked by political forces that would strangle the notion of free speech and competing ideologies is real and justified. But in this case, the capitulation came not when Disney and Lucasfilm decided to settle with Carano, but when they fired her in the first place.

In her first interview since losing the election to President Trump and leaving office, former Vice President Kamala Harris told Stephen Colbert on “The Late Show” that her decision not to run for California governor was more “basic” than saving herself for a “different office” — which is to say, another run for president in 2028.

After years of being a “devout public servant,” Harris said in the interview, set to air Thursday night, she just doesn’t want to be “in the system” right now.

“Recently I made the decision that I just — for now — I don’t want to go back in the system,” she said. “I think it’s broken.”

She said that was not to take away from the important work being done every day by “so many good people who are public servants,” such as teachers, firefighters, police officers and scientists.

“It’s not about them,” she said. “But you know, I believe, and I always believed, that as fragile as our democracy is, our systems would be strong enough to defend our most fundamental principles. And I think right now that they’re not as strong as they need to be.”

She said she instead wants to travel the country and talk to Americans in a setting that isn’t “transactional, where I’m asking for their vote.”

Colbert said to hear Harris — whom he called “very qualified for the presidency” — say that the American system is broken was “harrowing.”

“Well, but it’s also evident, isn’t it?” Harris replied, to applause from the studio audience.

The interview came on the heels of Harris’ announcements this week that she is not running for California governor and is releasing a memoir about her short, whirlwind presidential campaign following President Biden’s decision to drop from the race, and it was a big get for Colbert in what appears to be his final chapter on late-night TV.

CBS, blaming financial concerns across late night, announced July 17 that the 2025-2026 season of “The Late Show” would be its last.

The announcement followed Colbert sharply criticizing Paramount Global’s $16-million settlement with Trump over a CBS News “60 Minutes” interview with Harris during the presidential campaign, which Trump accused the venerable news show of manipulating to make her look better.

Paramount Global was at the time seeking a major merger with Skydance Media and needed the Trump administration’s approval, which it ultimately got. Just days before the announcement that his show would be ending, Colbert described the “60 Minutes” settlement as a bribe to get the merger deal done.

All that caused many observers and allies of Colbert to speculate that the cancellation of the show was political in nature. The Writers Guild of America, for example, said the company appeared to be “sacrificing free speech to curry favor with the Trump Administration.”

Trump said it was “not true” that he was “solely responsible for the firing of Stephen Colbert,” and that the “reason he was fired was a pure lack of TALENT” and that Colbert’s show was losing Paramount millions of dollars a year.

“And it was only going to get WORSE!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

Paramount has said the decision was “not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount,” though some polling has suggested many Americans don’t believe the company.

It’s unclear whether Harris considered any of that in granting Colbert her first interview since leaving office. However, it would almost certainly not have been her only reason.

Colbert is liberal and seen as a friendly interviewer by Democrats.

During Thursday’s interview, the late-night host heaped praise on Harris. After saying it was “harrowing” to hear she feels the system is broken, he asked whether she was giving up fighting.

Harris said she was not.

“I am always going to be part of the fight,” Harris said. “That is not going to change.”

After finally getting approval from the Federal Communications Commission, Skydance Media is just weeks away from completing its $8-billion merger with Paramount Global, leading to sweeping changes for some of the most iconic media brands.

CBS, MTV Networks and Paramount Pictures are all bracing for upheaval when Larry Ellison and his son, David, take the keys from Paramount Global controlling shareholder Shari Redstone. The long-running ownership saga has played out while the rules of the media industry have been upended by streaming and, more recently, a White House unafraid to use its muscle to silence critics.

Skydance and its backer, RedBird Capital Partners, have promised investors that it will find $2 billion in cost savings, which means further belt-tightening and layoffs.

“This will be the most dramatic change to the organization since its inception,” said one longtime CBS insider who was not authorized to comment publicly.

Here is what Wall Street and the media industry will be watching for once the deal closes on Aug. 7:

Will Skydance spend enough to supercharge streaming?

Last year, Paramount+ added 10 million new subscribers to reach 77.5 million. Its subscriber count is now 79 million, thanks also to NFL programming, CBS shows such as “NCIS” and original hits including “1923,” “Landman,” “Lioness” and “Tulsa King.” Paramount has projected full-year U.S. profitability for Paramount+ this year, making it one of the fastest subscription services to get there.

But its relatively scant resources and thinner slate has made it difficult to truly compete with Netflix and the other biggest players. One potential solution: partnering with a rival streamer to increase its reach.

“Questions around the long-term scalability of Parmamount+ continue to loom large,” analyst firm MoffettNathanson noted in a report Friday. “Will the new management team pursue external partnerships as a viable path forward?”

Ellison and his team have suggested that they will bring a tech-focused sensibility to Paramount. Technological prowess would help Paramount+ improve its user interface and recommendation process, which insiders acknowledge is currently underwhelming. As expected, the architect of Paramount+ original series strategy, Paramount Global co-CEO Chris McCarthy, will leave when the deal closes.

Can traditional TV be saved?

Analysts also want to see Skydance will increase investment in film and TV franchises to revive assets that have been constrained by Paramount’s debt.

While Skydance will get a robust library of films and TV shows, it will also be faced with the slow-melting iceberg that is broadcast and cable TV, which continues to lose viewers. Streaming has surpassed broadcast and cable as the leading source of video consumption just as Skydance takes over CBS and Paramount Global’s array of channels that include MTV, BET and Comedy Central.

Doug Creutz, an analyst for TD Cowen, believes the merged company should consider spinning off traditional TV businesses, similar to what Warner Bros. Discovery and Comcast are doing with their cable channels. Whether that will happen remains to be seen.

“There is a clear opportunity to improve Paramount’s growth profile by letting those assets go,” Creutz wrote Friday. “On the other hand, we suspect the Ellisons did not purchase Paramount in order to break it up for parts.”

A test of Skydance’s commitment to broadcast may come if the FCC relaxes TV station ownership rules, which would likely lead to consolidation.

“60 Minutes” correspondent Lesley Stahl with Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

(CBS Photo Archive / CBS via Getty Images)

How will ’60 Minutes’ reset?

CBS News’ “60 Minutes” received a vote of confidence with the naming of Tanya Simon, a respected veteran insider to take over as executive producer. She was the choice of the program’s strong-willed correspondents.

Simon’s appointment is expected to provide stability following the departure of longtime showrunner Bill Owens, who was forced out amid the push for a $16-million settlement over President Trump’s lawsuit claiming the program deceptively edited an interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris to make her look better to voters.

“60 Minutes” remained tough in its White House coverage as negotiations went on. The question is whether that approach will continue with new owners. Larry Ellison has a friendly relationship with the president, and the new owners agreed to appoint an ombudsman to oversee news coverage.

Getting it right matters from a business perspective too, as “60 Minutes” remains the most profitable program on CBS.

With Simon in place, new management is expected to address other areas of the news division that can use improvement. The network’s revamp of the “CBS Evening News” has been a disappointment in the ratings and will likely see some changes.

In the longer term, there has been chatter that Skydance may set its sights on acquiring CNN from Warner Bros. Discovery and combining it with the broadcast news operation, an idea that has been considered numerous times over the last few decades.

“South Park” characters Eric Cartman, left, Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski.

(Comedy Central)

Will creative freedom be tested?

CBS canceled “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” upsetting his fans, progressive Democratic legislators and other late-night hosts who make their living lampooning President Trump.

The network said it was strictly a business decision, as the younger viewers who made late-night TV monstrously lucrative for decades are no longer showing up. The timing of the move made the company look as if it were capitulating to Trump, who long had the host on his enemies list.

But Colbert will remain on the air through May. The show has already been sold to advertisers for next season. The host has remained unrelenting in his mockery of Trump.

The season premiere of “South Park” only upped the ante. The animated series made references to the “60 Minutes” deal, showed Trump in bed with the devil and aired its own version of a Trump-mandated PSA, showing a naked president with talking genitalia.

There is no question both shows will test the patience of the new owners.

Pulling Colbert off or censoring the “South Park” creators, who just received a $1.5-billion deal to continue their show and move its library to Paramount+, would lead to a far greater backlash than what has been seen so far. Any attempt to curtail their voices will send a negative message to creative types who consider working with the company’s movie and TV operations going forward.

Tom Cruise in “Mission: Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One” from Paramount Pictures and Skydance.

(Paramount Pictures and Skydance)

Can the movie business be revived?

Over the last few years, Paramount Pictures — home of franchises such as “Transformers” and “Mission: Impossible” — has ranked either fifth or fourth at the domestic box office. So far this year, the lone major movie studio still located in Hollywood proper has accounted for about 7% of ticket sales in the U.S. and Canada, according to box office website the Numbers.

Since the pandemic, the company has enjoyed a number of major hits, including “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Sonic the Hedgehog 3.” It has also had some solid singles and doubles, including “Bob Marley: One Love.” But overall, the more-than-century-old studio has struggled from underinvestment in its intellectual property and movie brands.

The latest “Mission: Impossible” starring Tom Cruise — the eighth and purportedly last in the series — grossed $589 million globally but cost $300 million to $400 million to make, not including marketing costs. Paramount’s latest effort, an animated “Smurfs” reboot, sputtered at the box office. Next up: a reboot of “The Naked Gun.”

The unit’s leader, Brian Robbins (also head of Nickelodeon at Paramount Global), is expected to leave the studio, though he has not officially announced his plans. David Ellison is a movie fan and is expected to take a particular interest in the operation, with plans to put Skydance’s chief creative officer, Dana Goldberg, in charge of film at Paramount. Skydance has worked with Paramount on movies before, producing “Maverick” and the “Missions: Impossible” films

HOUSTON, TEXAS – JANUARY 11: Denico Autry #96 of the Houston Texans sacks Justin Herbert #10 of the Los Angeles Chargers during the second half of the AFC Wild Card Playoff game at NRG Stadium on January 11, 2025 in Houston, Texas. (Photo by Brandon Sloter/Getty Images)

(Brandon Sloter / Getty Images)

Will the NFL take its ball elsewhere?

A transfer of ownership means the NFL can reopen its long-term deal with CBS, which has a Sunday package of games, the AFC Championship Game and two Super Bowls. The NFL is the lifeblood of broadcast television, providing a vast majority of the year’s most-watched programs.

Without the NFL, CBS would face tremendous challenges in getting fees from pay TV operators who carry its stations. Revenue from affiliates who pay the network for its programming would also dramatically decline.

Although the NFL is known for taking a pound of flesh at every opportunity, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has signaled he will give careful consideration before making any changes.

“We’ve had a long relationship with CBS for decades and we also have a relationship outside of that with Skydance,” Goodell told CNBC earlier this month. “We have a two-year period to make that decision. I don’t see that happening, but we have the option and it’s something we’re going to look at.”

The NFL could wait until 2029 when it has the option to open up the contract with all of its media partners. The new media deal for the NBA — $76 billion over 11 years — has the NFL believing its pact is underpriced.

Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.

David Ellison stepped within reach of his hard-fought prize, Paramount Global, after winning regulators’ blessing for his Skydance Media’s $8-billion takeover of the storied media company.

President Trump-appointed Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr approved the Skydance-Paramount merger Thursday after months of turmoil and a monumental collision between the president’s broad powers and press freedoms.

Carr’s consent came just three weeks after Paramount agreed to pay Trump $16 million to settle the president’s lawsuit over edits to a “60 Minutes” broadcast. Trump had claimed CBS producers doctored the October interview with then-Vice President Kamala Harris to boost her election chances. CBS denied his allegations, saying the edits were routine.

1st Amendment experts called Trump’s suit “frivolous.” But, after months of internal upheaval, Paramount capitulated. The move was widely seen as a prerequisite for Skydance to win FCC approval and push the Paramount-Skydance merger over the finish line.

Trump has said on social media that, as part of the settlement, he also expects the new owners to provide another $20 million in public service announcements and other free programming.

The FCC approval clears the final regulatory hurdle for the acquisition that will bring another technology titan to Hollywood. Carr authorized the transfer of Paramount’s CBS television station licenses to Larry Ellison, Oracle’s co-founder who ranks among the world’s richest men, and his family.

“Americans no longer trust the legacy national news media to report fully, accurately, and fairly. It is time for a change,” Carr said in a statement. “That is why I welcome Skydance’s commitment to make significant changes at the once storied CBS broadcast network.”

The FCC commissioners voted 2-1 in favor of the deal. Two Republicans, Carr and Olivia Trusty, voted yes, while Anna Gomez, the lone Democrat on the panel, dissented.

“After months of cowardly capitulation to this Administration, Paramount finally got what it wanted,” Gomez said in a statement. “Unfortunately, it is the American public who will ultimately pay the price for its actions.”

The Ellisons’ takeover of Paramount is expected to be complete in the coming days.

Santa Monica-based Skydance, which is owned by the Ellison family and private equity firm RedBird Capital Partners, faces an uphill slog to restore Paramount to its former glory. Years of programming under-investments, management missteps and ownership turmoil have taken a heavy toll.

Viewers’ shift to streaming has upended Paramount’s TV networks, CBS, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, MTV and BET. Paramount Pictures lags behind Disney, Universal and Warner Bros.

Sumner Redstone’s family will exit the Hollywood stage, after nearly 40 years. The pugnacious mogul from Boston, who died five years ago, presided during an era of entertainment excesses in the 80s, 90s and early aughts — when Paramount released beloved blockbusters and cable television was in its hey-day.

For a stretch this spring, it seemed the Skydance deal could unravel.

The FCC’s review had stalled amid the legal wrangling over Trump’s lawsuit. Carr, in one of his first moves as chairman, separately opened an FCC inquiry into alleged news distortion with the “60 Minutes” Harris interview — putting CBS uncomfortably under the microscope.

Paramount’s controlling shareholder Shari Redstone (Sumner’s daughter), and some Skydance executives, urged Paramount to settle. But CBS News executives refused to apologize to Trump for the “60 Minutes” edits, saying CBS journalists did nothing wrong. The settlement, which steers money to Trump’s future presidential library, did not include an apology from CBS News or Paramount.

Two high-level CBS News executives departed and three progressive U.S. senators demanded answers. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and the others lambasted the settlement talks, saying that paying Trump money to end a “bogus” lawsuit simply to get a merger approved could be akin to paying a bribe.

The winds shifted in June. David Ellison, Larry’s 42-year-old son, talked briefly with Trump at a UFC fight in New Jersey. Days later, Trump talked favorably about his friendship with Larry Ellison and the Paramount-Skydance deal.

“Ellison’s great,” Trump told reporters in mid-June. “He’ll do a great job with it.”

David Ellison last week met with Carr in Washington to persuade him that Paramount would be in good hands. They discussed the firm’s commitments and management philosophies. Skydance also gave assurances that its Chinese investors would not have a say in the company’s affairs.

Last week, CBS separately said it was canceling “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” in May. The company said the move was financial, but conservatives and progressives alike questioned the timing due to the pending merger and Colbert’s pointed barbs at Trump.

Skydance outlined its planned changes at Paramount in a letter this week to Carr. Skydance promised to cancel all diversity initiatives, disband its Office of Global Inclusion and strip references to DEI from its internal and external messaging. The company also said news and entertainment programming would not tilt in any one political direction.

“New Paramount’s new management will ensure that the company’s array of news and entertainment programming embodies a diversity of viewpoints across the political and ideological spectrum, consistent with the varying perspectives of the viewing audience,” Skydance’s general counsel Stephanie Kyoko McKinnon wrote in Tuesday’s letter to Carr.

The company said it would install an ombudsman at CBS News for at least two years.

“They are committing to serious changes at CBS,” Carr told reporters in Washington earlier Thursday. “I think that would be a good thing. They’ve committed to addressing bias issues. They committed to embracing fact-based journalism.”

Ellison began his pursuit of Paramount two years ago.

He formalized his bid by January 2024. After months of negotiations, Paramount’s board and Redstone approved the Skydance takeover July 7, 2024.

Paramount’s leaders considered other prospective owners but concluded that Skydance, with its Ellison backing, would bring a solid financial foundation for a company that traces its roots back more than a century. Redstone also wanted Paramount to remain whole, rather than broken into pieces.

As part of the agreement, Skydance will be folded into the public company. Its backers will inject new capital to bolster Paramount’s finances and install a new cadre of leaders. Ellison will serve as chairman and chief executive. Former NBCUniversal Chief Executive Jeff Shell is slated to be president.

CBS’ current leader George Cheeks, one of Paramount’s three co-chief executives, could join the new regime. But the two other current chiefs, Chris McCarthy and Brian Robbins, are expected to depart.

The Skydance deal is expected to be executed in two parts. Larry Ellison and RedBird will buyout the Redstone family holding company, National Amusements Inc., for $2.4 billion.

After their debts are paid, the Redstone family will leave with $1.75 billion. The family controls 77% of Paramount’s voting shares, which will be passed to the Ellisons and RedBird.

Under the deal terms, the new Paramount will offer to buy out some shares of existing shareholders and inject $1.5 billion into Paramount’s strained balance sheet.

Paramount will then absorb Skydance, which has a movie, television, animation, video games and a sports unit. The deal values Skydance at $4.75-billion.

“We’re going to reorganize and restructure the business to prioritize cash flow generation,” David Ellison told investors last July. “With a track record in both entertainment and technological expertise [we will] be able to transition the company through this period of time to ensure that Paramount’s brightest days are ahead.”

While “60 Minutes” will soon have a new owner, the CBS newsmagazine’s next executive producer is coming from inside the family.

Tanya Simon, a 25-year veteran of the program, will take on the role vacated by Bill Owens in April. She has served as interim executive producer since his departure.

She is the daughter of the late Bob Simon, one of the best known correspondents during the program’s 57 year history.

Changes at the top of “60 Minutes” have been rare. Simon will be only the fourth executive producer in the program’s history and the first woman.

Simon’s appointment will be a relief to the program’s staff, where morale has been rocked by parent company Paramount Global’s battle with President Trump. The correspondents of the program signed a letter to company co-chairman George Cheeks urging him to give Simon the job.

Simon will have the backing of her colleagues who are thankful they won’t be dealing with an outsider who might not value the program’s editorial rigor and independence. But she will be faced with the challenge of navigating the operation after one of the most difficult periods in its history.

Paramount Global agreed to pay $16 million to settle Trump’s lawsuit against “60 Minutes” over the editing of an interview with his 2024 opponent, then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump claimed the interviews was deceptively edited to aid Harris in the election.

The case was labeled as frivolous by 1st Amendment experts and the settlement widely seen as a capitulation to Trump in order to clear a path for Paramount’s $8-billion merger with David Ellison’s Skydance Media.

While “60 Minutes” did not issue an apology or acknowledge any wrongdoing, the program is likely to face intense scrutiny going forward. Critics will be looking for signs of the program pulling its punches in reporting on Trump. In order to clear the Paramount Global deal with the FCC, Skydance has agreed to name a news division ombudsman that will report to the company’s president for at least the next two years.

“Tanya Simon understands what makes ’60 Minutes’ tick,” CBS News President Tom Cibrowski said in. a statement “She is an innovative leader, an exceptional producer, and someone who knows how to inspire people,” “

Simon got her start at CBS News in 1996 as a researcher for its other newsmagazine “48 Hours.” She joined “60 Minutes” in 2000, working with correspondent Ed Bradley on a variety of reports including the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. She went on to produce for nearly all of the program’s correspondents including her father.

Her work has earned virtually every major broadcast honor, including multiple Emmy Awards, the Peabody and the DuPont-Columbia Award.

As legacy news brands turn to podcasters to court online audiences, another digital media upstart has been invited to sit at the grown-ups table.

Fox News Media this week signed a licensing deal with the makers of “Ruthless,” a popular conservative podcast, a move aimed at expanding the network’s digital reach.

The five-year-old podcast is co-hosted by public affairs and digital advocacy consulting firm Cavalry LLC’s founding partners Josh Holmes, Michael Duncan and John Ashbrook, as well as Shashank Tripathi, a commentator known by the pseudonym “Comfortably Smug.” It will operate under the Fox News Digital division led by Porter Berry. The co-hosts will also get exposure on the Fox News Channel.

The move is another sign of traditional media outlets looking for ways to appeal to audiences who are no longer in the pay-TV universe. Faced with a slow but steady decline in audience levels due to competition from streaming, upstart digital operations are seen as a route to reach those consumers.

Podcasts — particularly those hosted by comedians such as Joe Rogan and Andrew Schulz — proved influential in the 2024 presidential election as more traditional news outlets felt their relevance waning.

“Ruthless” has gained a large following among men aged 18 to 45, a group that is spending less time with traditional TV, where Fox News is the most-watched cable channel and often tops broadcast networks in prime time. The podcast is regarded as the conservative answer to “Pod Save America,” the popular digital program led by four former Obama aides, which is produced by Los Angeles-based Crooked Media.

Recent “Ruthless” episodes covered anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles and Elon Musk’s proposal for a new political party.

Fox News Media has a stable of podcasts hosted by the network’s on-air talent such as Will Cain. But “Ruthless” is the first outside entity to join its digital platforms, and similar deals could follow.

Fox News has a multiyear deal with “Ruthless,” which will share in the revenue the podcast generates across the network’s various platforms. The “Ruthless” partners will retain editorial control over the podcast, although their right-leaning worldview is in keeping with other commentators on Fox News. They will also serve as Fox News contributors appearing on the TV network’s programs.

Others media giants have gotten into the more freewheeling online sphere by working with podcasters and YouTubers.

ESPN reached into the digital media space when it picked up sports commentator Pat McAfee’s program — a hit on YouTube — for its TV networks. McAfee retains control of the program, which is licensed by the Walt Disney Co. unit.

Earlier this year, Fox News parent Fox Corp. acquired Red Seat Ventures, which provides ad sales, marketing and production support for digital content creators, many of them aimed at politically conservative audiences.

There may be more such deals ahead.

The Fox News announcement follows reports that David Ellison, whose company Skydance Media has a merger agreement with Paramount Global, has engaged in talks about acquiring The Free Press, a popular digital news site launched by former New York Times opinion writer Bari Weiss.

The entity, which produces Weiss’ current affairs podcast “Honestly” and uses the independent newsletter publishing platform Substack, would operate separately from Paramount Global’s CBS News division, according to one person familiar with the discussions who was not authorized to comment publicly.

For months, CBS News has been roiled with trepidation that parent company Paramount Global would write a big check to make President Trump’s $20 billion lawsuit go away.

On Tuesday night, those fears came true.

Paramount Global agreed to pay $16 million to settle Trump’s legal salvo against “60 Minutes” over the editing of an interview with his 2024 opponent, then-Vice President Kamala Harris.

Within the news organization, there was anger over what is widely seen as a capitulation to Trump in order to clear a path for Paramount’s $8-billion merger with David Ellison’s Skydance Media. The case was labeled as frivolous by 1st Amendment experts.

But among some CBS News veterans, tempers were calmed by a sobering reality: that the outcome could have been worse.

The biggest concern inside the news division since Trump’s complaint was that the media company would be strong-armed into making an apology or statement of regret over a case that they believed had no merit. Amid the internal anger over the settlement, there is relief that that did not happen.

“Everybody knew that was a line in the sand,” said a relieved CBS News veteran not authorized to comment publicly on the matter.

Another journalist at the network, speaking on the same condition, said the thinking among many was that any financial payment of less than $20 million without an apology would count as a partial win.

As the negotiations to end the suit lingered, it became more apparent that corporate interests overrode any concerns about the appearance of caving to Trump’s demands.

Trump filed suit in October, claiming “60 Minutes” edited an interview with Harris to make her look smarter and bolster her chances in the election, which Trump won decisively. CBS denied the claims, saying the edits were routine.

“If there wasn’t a merger pending and they took this to court they would have won,” the journalist said of Trump’s case. “I think they understood that if they made an apology they would have an internal rebellion and they would have because there was nothing to apologize for.”

Some say that the departures of former “60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens and CBS News and stations head Wendy McMahon were enough to satisfy the Trump camp‘s desire for an apology. Both executives were adamant that CBS News did nothing improper in the handling of the Harris of interview.

Trump’s legal team claimed victory.

“President Donald J. Trump delivers another win for the American people as he, once again, holds the Fake News media accountable for their wrongdoing and deceit,” a spokesman said in a statement.

But while “60 Minutes” avoided the humiliation that would have come with a statement of contrition, the program that is the foundation of the news division now has to move forward in an era of media mistrust on the political right and disappointment on the left by those who believe courage is in short supply.

According to several CBS News insiders who spoke to The Times, no one is expected to depart “60 Minutes” in protest of the settlement decision.

Andrew Heyward, a former CBS News president who is now a consultant, said it will be up to the new owners of CBS to maintain the program’s journalistic independence. “If that’s jeopardized in the future, that would be unfortunate for CBS News and the country,” he said.

Though there is anger, many feared a bleak future for the news organization and the rest of the network if Paramount Global couldn’t close the Skydance deal. The lawsuit was seen as an obstacle to the deal, which needs approval from the Federal Communications Commission, run by Trump appointee Brendan Carr.

“We can get outraged all we want, but the fact is we were in a really precarious situation,” said one of the journalists not authorized to speak publicly. “If that merger went dead, I don’t know if anyone would have come along and bought the whole company.”

While ownership change usually generates fear and uncertainty through media organizations, insiders at CBS News say they will be happy to see Paramount Global’s controlling shareholder Shari Redstone in their rearview mirror once the Skydance deal is done.

The feelings inside the news division regarding Skydance range from hope for new investment from deep-pocketed Ellison to resignation that “it can’t get any worse.”

As for any damage to its reputation, CBS News is taking some comfort in the fact that ABC News hasn’t noticeably suffered from its own $16 million settlement over anchor George Stephanopoulos mistakenly saying Trump was convicted of rape rather than sexual abuse in the civil suit brought by E. Jean Carroll. Stephanopoulos signed a new contract at the network amid the controversy and his program “Good Morning America” hasn’t suffered a ratings loss since.

Viewers have high expectations for “60 Minutes,” which after 57 seasons still ranks as the most-watched news program on television (it’s also the most profitable show on CBS). If the program is allowed to maintain the same standard of deep reporting it’s known for, the audience will get past a bad corporate decision, according to Heyward.

“People on the right will say it’s another example of mainstream media getting what it deserves,” Heyward said. “People on the left will say it’s another example of a corporation caving to President Trump for its own selfish interests. And most people will go back to watching ’60 Minutes’ and expect strong independent reporting without fear or favor — that’s what really matters.”