Trump Claims He Once Lobbied ViacomCBS Chair Shari Redstone to Turn CBS Into Conservative Network: You Would ‘Quadruple Your Ratings’

Former President Donald Trump revealed Wednesday that he once lobbied ViacomCBS Chair Shari Redstone to turn CBS News into a conservative network.

He made the revelation in an afternoon interview on Dan Bongino’s show on YouTube. “Shari Redstone, someone that I like a lot, we’ve had a great relationship for a long time — her father and I got along,” Trump told Bongino. “She’s very smart, very good. And I told Shari that if she took her news and made it a conservative newscast, you know, CBS Evening News, if you made that a conservative newscast, you would double, triple, maybe even quadruple your ratings. But so far, they haven’t done it. But that’s OK, whatever it is, let them. But if they did that, they would do numbers like they haven’t seen before, and I have no doubt about it.”

Numerous reports around the time Trump left office indicated he was thinking about starting his own news network. However, he indicated in his interview with Bongino that he was still pleased with One America News and Newsmax — and reiterated his long-standing criticism of Fox News.

“I wouldn’t say Fox has been exactly perfect, [there] has been a big difference at Fox between what it is now and four years ago,” Trump said. “But we’ve had others come along, and they’re doing well. You look at OAN, [it’s] been incredible, actually … and Newsmax has been really good. Others are coming along, and people are seeing — they’re watching these conservative networks.”

He also said he his attorneys were “considering” action against CNN related to a video released by Project Veritas this month, which featured one of the network’s staffers suggesting it proactively worked against Trump during his 2020 campaign.

“Maybe we will do something with it,” he said. “We read the transcripts, and the lawyers can’t even believe it. This is like a campaign contribution of a magnitude we’ve never seen before.”

Watch above via The Dan Bongino Show. (The relevant portion begins around the 18:00 mark.)

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!