Paramount Global chair Shari Redstone has confirmed her thyroid cancer diagnosis amid a high-stakes sale linked to President Donald Trump’s $25 million 60 Minutes lawsuit.
The diagnosis was made about two months ago, but hadn’t been revealed until a spokesperson for the media executive broke the news to multiple outlets on Thursday.
Redstone was diagnosed after experiencing symptoms including fatigue.
Her thyroid gland was removed, but some of the cancer cells had spread to her vocal cords, according to The New York Times, which first reported the diagnosis.
Redstone’s spokesperson, Molly Morse, said the Paramount chair is being treated with radiation.
“She and her family are grateful that her prognosis is excellent,” Morse said.
In the meantime, Redstone will continue to head Paramount.
“While it has been a challenging period, she is maintaining all professional and philanthropic activities throughout her treatment, which is ongoing,” the spokesperson said.
The news of Redstone’s diagnosis comes as Paramount works to close a merger with Skydance Media.
Skydance agreed to acquire Paramount last July, which would leave the Redstone family without a stake in the company.
But the merger still requires approval from the Federal Communications Commission. Plans for the merger became more complicated last October when Trump sued CBS News, which Paramount owns, and its news program, 60 Minutes.
At the heart of the lawsuit, in which Trump is seeking more than $25 million, is an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris the program aired before the 2024 presidential election.
Trump’s lawyers argue that the editing of a long-winded answer the then-Democratic presidential nominee gave was “deceitful.”
Harris was shown giving two different answers to the same question during a preview of the episode on Face the Nation and when the 60 Minutes episode aired later that day.
60 Minutes fired back, calling Trump’s claims “false” and arguing that they edited the interview to be “more succinct.”
“60 Minutes gave an excerpt of our interview to Face the Nation that used a longer section of her answer than that on 60 Minutes. Same question. Same answer. But a different portion of the response,” the program said.
The Wall Street Journal recently reported that Paramount has offered Trump a $15 settlement, citing people familiar with the matter.
This prompted Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Ron Wyden of Oregon to write a letter to Redstone, warning the executive that Paramount “may be breaking the law.”
“Paramount appears to be trying to settle a lawsuit that it has assessed as ‘completely without merit,’ and moderating the content of its programs in order to obtain approval of this merger. Under the federal bribery statute, it is illegal to corruptly give anything of value to public officials to influence an official act,” the letter read.
