Exclusive / Fox-Roku deal poised to clear Justice Department scrutiny under consent decree - Semafor

Fox’s $22 billion acquisition of Roku is poised to clear Justice Department scrutiny and move forward under a consent decree, according to people familiar with the deliberations, despite efforts from a right-wing ally of President Donald Trump to hold up the deal.

It’s unclear what a consent decree would entail, or what terms are being considered. It’s possible the DOJ could change course, the people said. Fox declined to comment.

Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward also declined to comment on the deal. “However, we can affirm that this DOJ under President Trump’s leadership will continue to prioritize affordability for all Americans across our economy,” he said in a statement.

The deal, which would unite Fox’s content empire of news and sports with Roku’s dominant connected-TV operating system, had worried rivals who fear that Fox will favor its own content. Roku’s free, ad-supported channel also competes for viewers and content with Tubi, which Fox owns. Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch has said his “expectation” is to run the two businesses separately while selling advertising across them.

Semafor first reported in September that antitrust regulators were widening the inquiry into the deal, days before the two companies confirmed the deeper probe, known as a “second request.” That enhanced scrutiny came in part because of pressure from Newsmax majority owner Chris Ruddy, who bills himself as a Trump confidant and has had a long-running spat with Fox owner Rupert Murdoch, Semafor later reported.

Ruddy, briefly a reporter for Murdoch’s New York Post in the 1990s, has been feuding with Fox for more than a year over streaming access to his media assets.

Murdoch’s camp has previously dismissed Newsmax’s efforts as a bid to “sue their way out of their own competitive failures,” and Murdoch himself has dined with Trump more than once. But it’s clear that Ruddy has been a headache for the Murdoch clan. Investors have fretted about the possibility that Fox’s deal for Roku could get tied up as a result of Ruddy’s efforts.

Those worries were exacerbated after Fox ousted business anchor Maria Bartiromo following an internal investigation into allegations she leaked internal network information and communications to the Trump administration, a claim her lawyers have disputed.

But if the deal goes through, it’s more evidence that the Murdoch name still carries a fair amount of weight in Washington.