The Trump administration on Thursday approved the long-awaited $8 billion merger between Skydance and Paramount Global, combining a media production company with the Paramount Pictures movie studio and CBS.

The Federal Communications Commission approved the controversial merger after Paramount and CBS took a series of actions that critics believed were intended to placate President Trump. It will turn the new company into an entertainment giant better positioned to compete against streaming services and tech powerhouses.

Paramount agreed earlier this month to pay $16 million to settle Trump’s lawsuit over an edited 60 Minutes interview with his 2024 opponent, former Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump boasted on Truth Social that Skydance agreed to pay an additional $20 million for advertising and promotions, but the company has not addressed the claim.

Trump has sued several other mainstream news outlets for defamation over alleged falsehoods and misleading reporting.

Last week, left-wing comedian Stephen Colbert announced that CBS would be canceling his show, a program with aging viewership and a $40 million annual operating deficit. Colbert’s cancellation is considered to be reflective of the decline of late-night television in an age of partisan hosts and endless streaming.

“I absolutely love that Colbert’ got fired. His talent was even less than his ratings,” Trump said on Truth Social in a post gloating about Colbert’s termination.

As part of the merger agreement, Skydance promised to promote a diverse array of viewpoints and bring unbiased coverage to CBS, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said. Carr also celebrated Skydance’s commitment to end diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, and its promise to strengthen local news.

“In particular, Skydance has made written commitments to ensure that the new company’s programming embodies a diversity of viewpoints from across the political and ideological spectrum. Skydance will also adopt measures that can root out the bias that has undermined trust in the national news media,” Carr stated.

“These commitments, if implemented, would enable CBS to operate in the public interest and focus on fair, unbiased, and fact-based coverage. Doing so would begin the process of earning back Americans’ trust. Today’s decision also marks another step forward in the FCC’s efforts to eliminate invidious forms of DEI discrimination.”

For at least two years, Skydance will have an ombudsman at CBS to report bias and other concerns to management. Skydance CEO David Ellison has reportedly held talks with Bari Weiss, editor of anti-woke media start-up the Free Press, about acquiring the Substack publication and incorporating Weiss’s editorial voice at CBS.

Weiss is best known for resigning from the New York Times in 2020 over its embrace of progressive identity politics and “illiberal” newsroom environment. The Free Press has over 1 million subscribers on Substack, and 125,000 of them are paid, Axios reported in April.

CBS news president Wendy McMahon left the network earlier this year after overseeing several high-profile controversies and navigating it through Trump’s intense criticism of its election coverage.