Talk about bad timing.
One day after President-elect Donald Trump wiped the floor with a CNN reporter during his first post-victory press conference, the chief executive of AT&T visited Trump Tower to meet with the next president.
Chief Executive Randall Stephenson seemed to be more than a bit concerned as he passed through the building’s marble lobby on Thursday morning after the pow-wow.
And why wouldn’t he be?
The telco giant’s $85 billion deal to buy Time Warner and its CNN, HBO, Warner Bros., and Turner Broadcasting units, part of Stephenson’s grand plan to grow the Dallas company’s mobile streaming video business, needs to be approved by Trump’s Justice Department.
After the meeting’s scheduled start, Trump was still simmering over CNN, tweeting:
The tweet, plus the way Trump tore into Time Warner’s CNN during Wednesday’s press conference, made it seem like Stephenson had his work cut out for himself in getting back on the president-elect’s good side.
The meeting with President-elect Trump was arranged prior to the spectacular Trump-CNN blowup, sources said on Thursday.
Trump blew up at CNN reporter Jim Acosta after accusing the cable news network of publishing a “fake news” story — about the intelligence community briefing the president-elect on supposed embarrassing evidence the Russians had on him.
CNN stood by its reporting.
One banker not involved in the deal told The Post that Trump would find it hard not to like Stephenson, adding: “Randall is a pro. It will be a great charm offensive. I think Randall will be saying, ‘I hear you’ and suggesting once we own it, the quality of reporting will improve. Not supporting the deal leaves it where it is.”
Time Warner Chief Executive Jeff Bewkes was not at the meeting.
Curiously, AT&T denied Trump and Stephenson even mentioned the elephant in the room — the proposed megamerger.
“Rather, as the country’s leading investor of capital for each of the last five years,” the spokesperson said, “the conversation focused on how AT&T can work with [Trump] to increase investment in the US, stimulate job creation in America, and make American companies more competitive globally.”
Entertainment analyst Rich Greenfield believes the deal will be approved. “If it gets blocked, then it would be a novel interpretation of the law,” he told The Post.
Paul Gallant, a DC specialist at Cowen & Co., put the odds of a deal happening at 60/40 — in line with other media watchers.
Trump has made his feelings about this deal and media consolidation widely known. On the campaign trail, then-candidate Trump said the proposed deal was “an example of the power structure I’m fighting.”
An aide to Trump has suggested his boss didn’t support the deal, according to a Bloomberg story.
Trump spokesman Sean Spicer declined to answer a question about the meeting on Thursday morning.
Time Warner shares closed Thursday up 17 cents, to $93.85. AT&T rose 1 percent, to $41.01.