Welcome back to In The Room, I’m Dylan Byers.

Tonight, in the wake of Trump’s eyebrow-raising interview with Univision, a closer look at the Kushner connection with the network’s new parentco, which is raising alarms in both the newsroom and the Biden White House.

But first…

• Two weeks back, I reported that David Zaslav was now eyeing Paramount Global as a potential acquisition target for Warner Bros. Discovery. In an interview with CNBC this week, WBD board member and Zaz mentor John Malone seemed to confirm as much, citing Paramount as an example of a company ripe for the picking. Investors already wary of Zaz’s performance at WBD—the stock ended the week down more than 12 percent—may be dubious about an already over-levered company buying another over-levered company. On the other hand, Zaz’s core competency is economic efficiency, and a Paramount acquisition would certainly give him more assets while offering opportunities to operate them in a lean manner.
• Ratings for the Trump-less G.O.P. primary debates continue to drop, a sign of broad voter indifference to the squabbling matches at the kids’ table. This week’s debate, hosted by NBC News, drew just 6.86 million viewers on linear television (down from 13 million for the first debate, on Fox News, and 9.3 million for the second, on Fox Business). An NBC rep was quick to note that the total viewership was 7.51 million when you factor in digital and streaming audiences—which is all well and good, but mostly just tells you how far legacy news organizations have yet to go in terms of growing their post-linear audiences.

Inside Univision, however, the hour-long sit-down raised alarms for another reason. The interview, which was conducted by a non-Univision journalist who did little to question or push back on Trump’s claims, effectively functioned as a propaganda special, current and former Univision journalists have protested. In it, they saw glaring evidence of a broader effort by their new parent company, which has close ties to Trump and especially to his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to curry favor with the former president and push the network further to the right.

In early 2022, Univision closed a $4.8 billion merger with Mexican television giant Televisa, creating TelevisaUnivision and elevating longtime Televisa executive Bernardo Gómez Martínez to the top of the new media juggernaut. Gómez, who serves as the company’s co-C.E.O., is described by Univision sources as a media kingmaker and the company’s main political operator and power broker, and some note that he was instrumental in the political rise of former Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto. Gómez has also struck up a close relationship with Kushner in recent years: The two men have hosted one another at their respective homes in Mexico City and New York, and in 2018, Gómez helped facilitate the Mexican government’s decision to award Kushner with the Order of the Aztec Eagle, the highest honor Mexico bestows upon foreigners—an honor Trump referenced during the interview. (At the time, Peña Nieto called Kushner a “grand ally of Mexico.”)

Since the merger, Univision’s editorial stance has shifted rightward, network sources said, presenting a stark contrast to the more adversarial posture Univision was known for during Trump’s first campaign. Indeed, the last time Trump spoke to Univision on camera was in 2015, when he repeatedly told then-star anchor Jorge Ramos to “sit down” during a press briefing before Ramos was thrown out for refusing to stop asking questions. Under TelevisaUnivision, Univision has made a greater effort to interview Republican politicians, the sources said, and earlier this year the network partnered with Fox Business as host of the second G.O.P. presidential primary debate—the first time Univision has ever partnered with Fox Corp. Some Univision journalists said developments like that reminded them of David Zaslav’s early attempt to reposition CNN as a centrist network by toning down anti-Republican rhetoric and hosting more conservative guests. (Coincidentally, Zaslav is a member of TelevisaUnivision’s board of directors, having joined Univision’s board in 2012.)

Univision journalists have varying feelings about the broader editorial shift, but TelevisaUnivision’s handling of the Trump interview took newsroom concern to a new level. The interview was conducted by Enrique Acevedo, a Televisa anchor and CBS News correspondent who seemed to show total deference to Trump over the course of a one-hour interview in which, in addition to his remarks about weaponizing the F.B.I. and D.O.J., Trump defended the separation of migrant families at the border and repeatedly claimed that the indictments against him were a political hoax. Sources inside Univision said it was highly unusual for the network to give an interview with an American political candidate to a non-Univision journalist.

In another move that raised eyebrows, Gómez and other top Televisa and Univision executives were present at Mar-a-Lago for the interview, a fact first reported by Semafor’s Max Tani, who published early excerpts of the interview on Thursday. During the interview, Trump also went out of his way to praise Univision’s owners: “[Latinos] have incredible skills, incredible energy, and they’re very entrepreneurial,” he said. “All you have to do is look at the owners of Univision. They’re unbelievable entrepreneurial people. And they like me.”

But on Thursday afternoon, the Univision representative informed the Biden team that they had a policy against running political ads during single-candidate news specials—a policy the sources close to the White House described as highly irregular. At the same time, Univision abruptly canceled an interview it had planned to conduct following the Trump special with Biden Hispanic Media Director Maca Casado. (A Univision spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment regarding these decisions.)

Inside Univision and Biden world, sources are wary about what they see as an overt effort to normalize and tacitly endorse Trump’s rhetoric, whether for Republican advertising dollars, currying favor with political allies, or broader motives. Whatever the case, one Univision source said, the special was “a repudiation of everything we stand for.”

• The Atlantic’s Barton Gellman talks to Peter Thiel.

• The New Yorker’s Michael Schulman visits post-strike Hollywood.

• Puck’s Julia Alexander considers the new Hulu value proposition.

• New York’s David Freelander listens to the Rudy Giuliani vodcast.

• ... And Megyn Kelly promises a “margarita” of a G.O.P. debate.