A potential Comcast-WBD deal would test the Trump regulatory regime

Comcast Chairman and CEO Brian Roberts attends the annual Allen & Co. Media and Technology Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, on July 9, 2025.

David A. Grogan | CNBC

Comcast is reporting its results on Thursday and could shed light on how executives view regulators’ attitude toward a potential NBCUniversal.Warner Bros. Discovery Fusion.

Warner Bros. Discovery, owner of TNT Sports, CNN, HBO, Warner Bros. Studio and other media companies, has officially put itself up for sale after “receiving interest from multiple parties,” WBD CEO David Zaslav said in a statement last week. CNBC reported that Comcast is among those interested.

Several experts and analysts believe Comcast has little to no chance of a deal from a regulatory perspective given President Donald Trump’s harsh words toward Comcast co-CEO and majority shareholder Brian Roberts. Others say the path forward may not be doomed.

Trump called Comcast and Roberts “a disgrace to the integrity of broadcasting” in a post on his social media platform Truth Social in April. Trump has also referred to Roberts as a “lowlifer” and referred to Comcast as “Concast.”

Some stock analysts have predicted that the Trump administration would block a Comcast takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery. WBD continues to pursue a planned separation into two listed companies while expanding its strategic review.

Paramount is trying to buy the entire company before it could split, and WBD has so far rejected three separate offers from the David Ellison-led company.

“It is almost certain that the Trump Justice Department would not allow CMSCA to purchase WBD and the outcome would be decided in court,” New Street Research analyst Blair Levin wrote in a note to clients, citing Trump’s public comments about Roberts.

“We believe together with our cable colleagues [Comcast’s] “Political standing in this administration is very low and we believe CMCSA would think long and hard about whether a deal is worth the long, arduous process of building enough goodwill to get the deal done,” wrote Raymond James analyst Ric Prentiss.

Some Comcast executives believe the regulatory concerns are either overblown or at least far too early to tell, according to people familiar with the matter who have knowledge of Comcast’s strategy but spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. There is some evidence that Comcast executives may be right.

A Comcast spokesman declined to comment.

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If the president likes it

Skydance Media received long-awaited approval from the Federal Communications Commission to merge with Paramount after the CBS parent company agreed to a $16 million settlement with Trump over a “60 Minutes” episode.

While a deal for WBD doesn’t require FCC review because Warner Bros. Discovery doesn’t own its own network, an acquisition of this size — WBD’s market cap is around $53 billion, plus another $30 billion in debt — could still attract the attention of Trump’s Justice Department.

Trump’s reputation as a dealmaker suggests that Comcast may be able to avoid any interference by ingratiating itself with the president.

Comcast is one of 37 companies supporting Trump’s effort to build a $300 million ballroom for the White House through the Trust for the National Mall.

Trump’s public dislike of Roberts and Comcast may be tied to Trump’s claims that MSNBC, owned by Comcast’s NBCUniversal, is left-leaning. It’s unclear whether Trump specifically cares about Comcast or NBCUniversal owning WBD assets other than CNN, which Trump has also regularly criticized.

If its main issue with Comcast’s purchase of WBD is CNN, a divestiture or deal without the network could sidestep those issues. Comcast is in the process of spinning off MSNBC into Versant, which will also become the parent company of CNBC.

While Roberts will remain a shareholder in Versant, MSNBC will no longer be part of Comcast once Versant becomes its own publicly traded company in early 2026.

Structuring a spin merge

In a hypothetical situation where Comcast would spin off NBCUniversal, which is currently slated to remain with the company following the Versant transaction, and merge it with WBD, LightShed analyst Rich Greenfield predicted the deal could make it through regulators.

Peter Supino of Wolfe Research proposed a plan under which NBCUniversal would issue new shares to WBD at an exchange ratio (removing Roberts’ voting control of the new company) and appoint a chairman and CEO “not named Roberts.” That combination could lead to a deal, he wrote in a note to clients.

“The main problems facing a Comcast offer — financing and politics — may be solvable,” Supino wrote.

While Comcast might shy away from pursuing a transaction that could be blocked by the Trump Justice Department, even that might not be a dealbreaker.

During Trump’s first term, his Justice Department blocked AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner, a former version of Warner Bros. Discovery. In June 2018, a U.S. District Court judge approved the $85.4 billion sale, ruling that the government had failed to show that the deal would harm consumers.

Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal, the owner of CNBC. Versant would become the new parent company of CNBC following Comcast’s planned spinoff of Versant.