Ted Sarandos dismissed Donald Trump’s social media demands for Netflix fire commissioner Susan Rice, saying the streamer’s bid for Warner Bros. Discovery is a business matter, not a political one.
“He likes to do things on social media,” Netflix’s co-chief executive and chief content officer said on BBC Radio 4’s Today program on Monday morning, when asked by presenter Amol Rajan to respond to the president’s intervention. Sarandos added: “This is a business deal. It’s not a political deal. This deal is being managed by the U.S. Department of Justice and regulators in Europe and around the world.”
The remarks came after President Trump on Saturday reshared a post by MAGA influencer Laura Loomer calling for Netflix to terminate Warner’s deal, adding, “Netflix must fire Susan Rice, a racist and deranged Trumpian, immediately or pay the price.” Rice is a former diplomat in the Obama administration and currently serves on Netflix’s board of directors.
Sarandos was speaking in London the morning after attending the BAFTAs and ahead of a visit to the National Film and Television School, where Netflix is announcing a new donation. The streamer has around 320 million subscribers worldwide, with nearly 20 million in the UK alone.
This interview took place at a pivotal moment in the Warner Bros. Discovery competition. Netflix made an $83 billion bid for its streaming assets on December 5th. Three days later, Paramount, led by David Ellison, son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison, launched a hostile $108 billion rival bid for the entire company. Warner Bros.’ Discovery board has repeatedly said it prioritizes Netflix’s offer, but it gave Paramount until late Monday to submit its best and final bid.
Sarandos argued for a deal with Netflix in candid terms. “Our deal is about growth,” he said, noting the company has spent $6 billion producing original programming in the UK since 2020 and created 50,000 jobs in the UK. He characterized Paramount’s approach as “a classic horizontal media merger that is always bad for consumers and always bad for creators,” and warned that if Paramount’s bid is successful, Hollywood’s five major studios will be reduced to four. He also said Paramount has committed to cutting $6 billion from its operations immediately after the deal closes, and that an additional $16 billion will be needed to eliminate debt. “You look at this and think, ‘Wow, this industry is going to be much smaller under Netflix’s ownership than it is under its ownership,'” he said.
When asked about the claims Rajan made to Trump regarding the Netflix deal, Sarandos cited Netflix’s track record of growth. “This is a vertical merger. We’re acquiring assets that we don’t have today, movie studios and distribution entities,” he said, stressing that Netflix would be adding to the market, not subtracting from it.
He also weighed in on the role of sovereign wealth funds in the Paramount consortium, which previously included Jared Kushner. Asked if it was wrong for foreign governments to fund news networks, Sarandos said: “I think it’s typically a bad idea.” He noted that some of the Gulf states involved are “not very enthusiastic about the First Amendment,” and said the proposal to not exercise editorial influence over CNN or CBS “seems very strange to me given the level of investment we’re talking about.”
Sarandos said he felt the intervention was “disingenuous” after director James Cameron sent a letter to the chairman of the Senate antitrust subcommittee warning that a Netflix acquisition would have “dire consequences for the theatrical film business.” He said he met privately with Prime Minister Cameron on December 20 to discuss Netflix’s commitment to 45 days of theatrical exclusivity for Warner Bros. films. “We spent five minutes of our conversation talking about that, but mostly Mehta talked about the glasses he’s developing for watching movies at home,” Sarandos said. He claimed that Netflix members watch seven movies a month, compared to the average American who visits the theater twice a year. “The more people see movies, the better, deeper and richer their relationship with movies will become,” he said. “I’m not going to lose the movie theater business.”
Sarandos disputed claims that Netflix is locking out TV in the UK, pointing out that the streamer currently has 59 projects in development in the UK, of which only around 17 are outside the UK. Asked pointedly if Netflix would ever have made ITV’s Mr Bates vs the Post Office, he answered without hesitation: “I would have made it straight away. I’m shocked that people would use that example.”
Sarandos was skeptical about a parliamentary committee’s proposal for major streamers to donate 5% of their UK subscriber income to a cultural fund for UK-centric drama. “Incentives are far more effective than duties,” he said, arguing that the UK had benefited greatly from production incentives and that adding duties could undermine these economic gains.
Sarandos pointed to YouTube as a key competitive force, noting that the platform accounts for nearly 9% of all TV viewing time in the UK, and that 55% of YouTube viewing currently takes place on TV. “It’s a zero-sum game. If you’re watching one app, you’re not watching a broadcast, you’re not watching the BBC, you’re not watching ITV, you’re not watching any other streaming service, including Netflix, and you still spend the same amount of time on your connected TV,” he said, adding that while studios and broadcasters continue to give YouTube free programming, it’s counterproductive that YouTube is growing at its own expense.
On the podcast, Sarandos described them as a natural evolution of late-night chat shows. “This is a new generation of chat shows where you don’t have to create one show that will appeal to everyone,” he said, pointing to lower production costs and a more specialized audience as part of a broader diversification of the entertainment landscape.
Listen to Sarandos’ full interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today here.
