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The National Enquirer, President Trump's favorite supermarket tabloid, is about to have a new owner: James Cohen, one of the sons of the founder of the Hudson News franchise. American Media Inc., the publisher of Enquirer, announced the deal Thursday.
The title, which represented a loss of money, was put on sale several weeks ago after its main owner did not want to be associated with the magazine, which attracted the attention of Federal investigators on his role in the 2016 presidential campaign, according to several people familiar with the issue.
American Media was in talks with several potential buyers, including California billionaire Ron Burkle, but the talks broke down last week. Since then, Mr. Cohen, whose father launched the Hudson News chain of stores, has rushed to buy the tabloid in trouble.
American Media, led by David J. Pecker, a long-time friend of Mr. Trump, also agreed to sell the Globe and the National Examiner as part of the deal with Mr. Cohen. The Washington Post first reported on the sale, that he anchored to $ 100 million.
The main owner of American Media, the Chatham Asset Management hedge fund headed by Anthony Melchiorre, pushed Mr. Pecker to sell the tabloid after he found himself at the center of a federal inquiry. Melchiorre no longer saw any advantage in being associated with The Enquirer, and the tabloid's financial losses and declining drawdowns provided additional motivation for a sale.
Mr. Pecker reportedly helped Mr. Trump's candidacy with the agreement with American Media on the purchase of a report by Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who claimed to have an affair with the president. The company bought it for $ 150,000 and never published it, according to a practice known in the tabloid industry as catch-and-kill. Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York gave Mr. Pecker a immunity in its investigation of the arrangement.
American Media has also signed a non-prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors. As part of this agreement, the company claimed to have made the payment to Ms. McDougal for "influencing the elections". The agreement, signed in September, also stipulated that American Media "would not commit any crime" for three years and that if this were the case, the company "will subsequently be prosecuted for any federal criminal offense of which this office would know.
This agreement has put American Media in a difficult position, now that federal prosecutors have started to investigate allegations of Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, that he was threatened by the company. Mr. Bezos, who was the subject of an 11-page investigation by Enquirer in January, accused American Media of extortion in a blog post.
Hudson News, founded by Mr. Cohen's father, Robert B. Cohen, was sold to the Swiss distributor Dufry in 2008. Mr. Cohen is no longer involved in this activity but sits on the board of directors of the company. new parent company.
This story will be updated.
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