This threat from the president came in after she said Democrats would push for corporate accountability if they regain power in the November midterm elections.
In a Truth Social post on Saturday, Trump described Rice, who served as President Joe Biden’s domestic policy chief and held top foreign policy posts under President Barack Obama, as “purely a political hack” with “no talent or skills.”
“HER POWER IS GONE, AND WILL NEVER BE BACK,” Trump wrote.
Rice was a member of the Netflix board from 2018 to 2021 and returned in 2023 upon his departure from the Biden administration.
CNBC reached out to the White House for a response but did not immediately respond, and a Netflix representative declined to comment on Trump’s comments.
In a previous post, far-right activist and Trump supporter Laura Loomer called Rice’s comments “anti-American” and encouraged the president to “kill the Netflix-Warner Bros. merger now.” Trump included a screenshot of that post. In her article, Loomer also tagged Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.
The remarks follow Trump’s prior statement to NBC News earlier this month that the Department of Justice will “handle” the agreement and that he will not participate in their probe.
Rice argued during a podcast last week that “it is not going to end well” for corporations, news organisations, and law firms that “bent the knee” to Trump, and that their deference is unpopular.
“There is likely to be a swing in the other direction, and they are going to be caught with more than their pants down,” Rice told Preet Bharara, a former US attorney for the Southern District of New York. “They’re going to be held accountable by those who come in opposition to Trump and win at the ballot box.”
She added, “If these corporations think that Democrats, when they come back in power, are going to play by the old rules and say, ‘Never mind, we will forgive you for all the people you fired and all the policies and principles you violated and all the laws you skirted,’ I think they got another thing coming.”
Netflix’s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery is presently being examined by the DOJ.
In a $72 billion transaction that excludes the company’s cable networks, including CNN, Netflix has proposed to acquire WBD.
In retaliation, Paramount Skydance made a hostile takeover offer for the entirety of WBD, guaranteeing its shareholders an all-cash transaction at $30 per share.
The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month that the DOJ is looking into whether Netflix’s potential merger could harm competition and how the company’s other acquisitions have impacted competition for creative talent.
According to documents cited by Bloomberg, the government is also investigating whether the streaming behemoth engages in anticompetitive practices when negotiating programming acquisition deals with independent content producers.
The chairman of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom’s global antitrust group and Netflix’s outside counsel, Steve Sunshine, told CNBC in a statement that the law firm has not received any notification that the DOJ is looking into monopolisation.
David Hyman, Netflix’s chief legal officer, stated in a statement that the business competes in a “very competitive market.”
Because “this deal is pro-consumer… pro-innovation, pro-worker,” Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos stated last month that he is certain the firm would be able to obtain regulatory permission.
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