Mark Ruffalo rejects Paramount antisemitism accusation over Warner Bros. Discovery merger criticism
Actor Mark Ruffalo responded to Paramount's accusation that his criticism of the Ellison family's proposed Warner Bros. Discovery merger invoked antisemitic tropes, calling the claim 'appalling and fundamentally dishonest.'
Actor and activist Mark Ruffalo has rejected accusations that his criticism of the Ellison family's proposed Warner Bros. Discovery merger amounted to antisemitism, responding directly to Paramount after the company said his comments invoked "antisemitic tropes" in what it called a corporate dispute.
"The accusation that I am antisemitic is appalling and fundamentally dishonest," Ruffalo said in a statement. "Criticizing the actions of the Israeli prime minister, a military technology contract, or the executives who supply it is not the same as criticizing Jewish people. This critical and necessary dialogue is then dishonestly framed as being anti-Israel." He added that his views come from his own political convictions and should never be interpreted as hostility toward Jewish people, for whom he expressed "deep love and respect."
The dispute began after Ruffalo reposted video remarks of Paramount board member Safra Catz appearing to tout the "really profoundly scary technologies" that Oracle, the company co-founded by Larry Ellison, used to assist the Israeli military following the Hamas terrorist attacks of Oct. 7, 2023. Ruffalo wrote that Oracle is the company Ellison is using to fund his son David's Warner Bros. acquisition, and warned that those technologies could be merged into one of the largest media conglomerates in the world and "one day used on you." He also described what he called a "genocide" built on an "apartheid system of oppression powered by Oracle."
A Paramount spokesperson responded by saying the company is "troubled when antisemitic tropes are invoked in purported service of a business dispute." The spokesperson added that words like "genocide" and "apartheid," applied to a corporate transaction, "aren't just wrong — they're a bridge too far, and they cheapen the very real suffering those words are meant to describe." The company said it does not "tolerate prejudice of any kind, against anyone."
In his Saturday response, Ruffalo went on to discuss what he called the "real consequences" of the merger, both for people who would feel its immediate effects and for the country at large. He said scrutinizing the Ellisons, including Oracle's business built on data, surveillance technology and government contracts, and the threat to editorial freedom and the loss of livelihoods for thousands of families, is "fair and necessary."
Ruffalo noted that the $111 billion deal would hand one family control over CNN, HBO and Warner Bros., backed in part by foreign money whose influence on editorial decisions has never been fully explained to the public. He pointed to lawmakers on both sides of the aisle calling for serious national security review and said regulators still haven't given the public a real answer. "Until they do, the merger shouldn't move forward," he said. "Now is the time to dive boldly into all these issues, not step back or concede."
The potential merger is being challenged by a coalition of 12 state attorneys general, and the companies have agreed not to close the deal until June 1, 2027, or until after a court decision on the states' claims, whichever comes first.
