The National Enquirer is sold for $ 100 million to James Cohen, CEO of Hudson News

Ending the association between a long-time friend of President Trump and the tabloid that favored him in the 2016 election, American Media Inc. (AMI) sells the National Enquirer for 100 Millions of dollars to James Cohen, CEO of Hudson News.

The supermarket tabloid, along with two sister publications, will be purchased by the tour operator's manager known for its newsstands at airports, according to people close to the deal.

The decision to sell came after Anthony Melchiorre, the hedge fund manager whose company controls AMI, was disillusioned by Enquirer's reporting tactics, overseen by David Pecker, Trump's confidant for many years.

American Media has been under intense pressure due to Enquirer's efforts to tip the 2016 presidential election in favor of Trump.

Pecker and his supermarket tabloid have also been mired in recent months in an unusually public enmity with Amazon's founder, Jeff Bezos, also owner of the Washington Post.

The sale of AMI's newsprint tabloid business, which also includes the National Examiner and the Globe, is expected to reduce AMI's debt to $ 355 million, according to a person familiar with the company's finances.

The company faced financial difficulties as it sought to refinance more than $ 400 million in debt this year and Enquirer's circulation continued to decline. The newspaper has sold an average of 516,000 copies per issue in 2014, but that number dropped to 218,000 in December, according to data compiled by the Alliance for Audited Media.

In addition to its fragile finances, American Media faced significant legal risk due to the efforts of Pecker and its content manager, Dylan Howard, and their alleged scraping efforts during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Pecker and Howard have entered into non-prosecution agreements with federal investigators to avoid charges for their role in the purchase, and then bury the story of a former Playboy model claiming to have an affair with Trump.

In August, as these senior officials finalized their non-suit agreements, the company's board of directors began looking for ways to offload the tabloid 'because they no longer wanted to handle such trouble Said a familiar person. with the deliberations of the council.