It’s perhaps the longshot of longshots, and funding for any deal expires Monday. Nevertheless, Standard General, the hedge fund controlled by Soohyung Kim, is continuing to send the message through outsourced its public relations team at New York’s Joele Frank that a full FCC vote should be held as soon as possible to save the transaction.
While more civil rights leaders and clergymen have surfaced as TEGNA transaction supporters, a key U.S. Senator has again written to the Commission expressing her desire for a full-scale examination of the multibillion-dollar deal and not to rush things.
Unfortunately, for Soo Kim, that’s no longer an option.
Massachusetts Democrat Elizabeth Warren has written a fresh letter to the FCC expressing her “continued support” for the Commission’s “thorough review” of the proposed Standard General acquisition of TV station owner TEGNA.
But, unlike, civil rights leaders across Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, including representatives from NAACP, Urban League, International Minority Coalition, and South Carolina Voter Education Project who are vocalizing their support of Soo Kim, Warren wants the FCC to use its statutory authority to block this $5.4 billion acquisition if it does not serve “the public interest, convenience, and necessity.”
To be clear, Warren is not saying the TEGNA transaction should be killed. But, given the ultra-tight timetable left on the deal’s financing, anything but an expedited full FCC vote between now and May 22 would all but kill the deal, announced more than one year ago.
In Warren’s view, “The FCC has a duty to review the possible anticompetitive effects of the merger, including reduced media competition, higher prices, and worker layoffs.”
That’s why the Senator urges the FCC “to continue its thorough and careful review, regardless of recent calls by supporters of the deal to rush through the agency consideration.”
The key problem: should the Commission restart its indefinite suspension of a hearing in front of the FCC’s Administrative Law Judge to answer lingering Media Bureau questions about the deal and rule that Standard General is able to proceed with its purchase, that decision could be months — or more than one year — away.
The “victory” would do little for Standard General with respect to funding the transaction, as its access to capital would be long gone.
That’s why Standard General is taking the approach of highlighting its minority-owned and women-led narrative post-closing, with Kim’s Standard General installing Deb McDermott as Dave Lougee’s successor as TEGNA CEO.
Add to that support from African American leaders and members of the clergy who have expressed their approval of the deal. The latest to say “yes” to Standard General are the Clergy & Laity for Economic Justice (CLUE) and Black Clergy for Economic Empowerment.
Meanwhile, there’s little if any insight as to whether scheduled FCC meetings on Thursday with Standard General and FCC Enforcement Bureau staff yielded any last-minute breakthroughs in giving Soo’s team any new path to closing the TEGNA deal.
As such, the media world is waiting, and come Tuesday TEGNA may find itself at an altar ready and willing to seek a new suitor.
