States settle Paramount-Warner merger with film quotas and newsroom safeguards

California and 11 other states settled their antitrust challenge to Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, securing film-production quotas (30 per year for the first two years, then 32 per year or a fee), over $1 billion in U.S. production investment, independent editorial boards for CNN and CBS News, a five-year prohibition on writer layoffs at CBS News, and a framework for separate Paramount/Warner basic cable negotiations plus a $47.5 million workforce fund; WGA and SAG-AFTRA settlements accompany the deal, which still awaits final antitrust clearance and boosted shares on the news.