| a360media | |
| Company type | Private |
| Industry | Media |
| Founded | 1988; 38 years ago (1988) |
| Defunct | 2024; 2 years ago (2024) |
| Fate | Acquired byMcClatchy |
| Headquarters | New York City, U.S.[1] |
Key people | Anthony Melchiorre (owner) Roger Altman |
| Products | Newspapers Magazines |
| Owner | Chatham Asset Management Omega Charitable Partnership, L.P. |
Number of employees | 3,160 (2006) |
| Website | accelerate360 |
A360 Media, LLC (a360), formerlyAmerican Media, Inc. (AMI), was an Americanmagazine publisher.
It was originally formed in 1988 as the parent company of theNational Enquirer following the death of its previous ownerGeneroso Pope Jr.. AMI's holdings expanded considerably in the 1990s and 2000s, with the company acquiring othersupermarket tabloids such asGlobe, theNational Examiner, andStar, as well as other magazines dealing in lifestyle and entertainment-related topics (having included publications such asIn Touch Weekly,Men's Journal,Soap Opera Digest,Us Weekly, andWoman's World among others).
In the mid-2010s, AMI and its then-CEODavid Pecker were controversially engaged in "catch and kill" tactics to protectDonald Trump during his2016 U.S. presidential electioncampaign, having paid figures for the exclusive rights to stories containing damaging allegations surrounding Trump, only to quietlyspike the stories without ever publishing them.[2] In December 2018, AMI admitted to a campaign finance violation after having paidKaren McDougal $150,000 in one of these cases.[2][3][4]
In 2014, AMI was acquired byChatham Asset Management; under its ownership, AMI began to make further acquisitions and place a larger focus on its "glossy" publications, while consequently pursuing the sale of its tabloids. In 2020, AMI merged with Chatham Asset Management-owned wholesale company Accelerate 360, and was renamed a360media. The company then merged with Chatham Asset Management-owned newspaper publisherThe McClatchy Company in December 2024, forming the McClatchy Media Company.
The modern American Media came into being afterGeneroso Pope Jr., longtime owner of theNational Enquirer, died in 1988, and his tabloids came under new ownership. American tabloids began consolidating in 1990, when American Media boughtStar from Rupert Murdoch. The purchase of Globe Communications (owner of theGlobe and theNational Examiner) followed nine years later.[5]Roger Altman, throughEvercore Partners, bought a controlling stake in American Media in 1999.[6]
American Media is not to be confused with American Media Distribution, the international news coverage firm. American Media's former corporate headquarters inBoca Raton, Florida, figured prominently in news headlines in late 2001, after ananthrax attack was perpetrated on the company[7] and other media outlets.[8] Since then the corporate headquarters have moved to New York City at 1 Park Avenue inManhattan, before moving to theFinancial District to the formerJP Morgan Chase headquarters at4 New York Plaza. That building was severely damaged byHurricane Sandy but reopened in February 2013.
AMI continued to expand after it boughtJoe Weider's Weider Publications in 2002. Joe Weider continued to manage control of his magazines under AMI's Weider Publications subsidiary until his death in March 2013.[9][10] Eli Lippman was appointed the Director of Audience Development and subsequently as Director of Digital.[11]
American Media also owned Distribution Services, an in-store magazine merchandising company. In fall 2002, it launched the book-publishingimprint, AMI Books.[12]
In 2009, American Media was taken over by its bondholders to keep it out of bankruptcy.[13]
In November 2010, American Media filed forChapter 11 bankruptcy protection due to nearly $1 billion in debt, and assets of less than $50,000.[14] Its subsidiary, American Media Operations Inc., listed assets of $100 to $500 million and debt of over $1 billion.[15] It exited in December.
In May 2014, American Media announced a decision to shift the headquarters of theNational Enquirer from Florida, where it had been located since 1971, back to New York City, where it originally began asThe New York Enquirer in 1926.[16] In August 2014, American Media was acquired by Chatham Asset Management andOmega Charitable Partnership.[17]
In 2015, American Media soldShape,Natural Health, andFit Pregnancy toMeredith.[18]
In 2016, Pecker revealed to the Toronto Star that AMI now relied on support from Chatham Asset Management and its owner Anthony Melchiorre.[19][20] The $4 billion hedge fund owns 80 percent of AMI's stock.[20]
In March 2017, American Media acquiredUs Weekly fromWenner Media for a reported $100 million.[21] Three months later, in June 2017, American Media also acquiredMen's Journal from Wenner Media.[22]
In June 2018, American Media acquired 13 brands fromBauer Media Group includingIn Touch Weekly,Life & Style andCloser to add to their celebrity portfolio. They also acquired Bauer Media's kids group includingJ-14 andGirl's World.[23]
In February 2019, American Media acquiredTEN's adventure sports properties.[24]
In April 2019, theNational Enquirer was reported to be up for sale and likely to be sold within days. The company stated that it had shifted its emphasis away from tabloids to its "glossy" magazines such asUs Weekly andMen's Journal.[25] This came following pressure from Chatham owner Anthony Melchiorre, who expressed disapproval of the Enquirer's style of journalism.[20][26] On April 18, 2019, AMI accepted an offer fromHudson News Distributors head James Cohen and agreed to sell not only theNational Enquirer, but alsoGlobe andThe Examiner to Hudson News Distributors for $100 million.[27][28] At the time the sales were announced, AMI was approximately $355 million in debt.[29] The sale, however, fell through.[30]
In August 2020, Chatham Asset Management announced it would merge AMI with Accelerate 360, a wholesale distribution company it also owned. As part of the merger, AMI was officially renamed a360media on October 1.[31][32]
In 2022, A360 acquired single issue magazine publisher Centennial Media.[33] Also in 2022, A360 soldMen's Journal and the Adventure Sports Network properties to The Arena Group.[34]
In February 2023, A360 announced that it would sell its tabloid titles to a joint venture of Vinco Ventures and Icon Publishing.[35][36] The sale later fell through; a360media subsequently downplayed theNational Enquirer from its assets[37][38]
In August 2024,McClatchy—a newspaper publisher that Chatham Asset Management had acquired out of bankruptcy in 2020[39]—announced that it would merge with A360media.[40] The merger was completed in December 2024, with McClatchy reorganized as the McClatchy Media Company, and a360media brought under the McClatchy Lifestyle & Entertainment division. The company officially stated that the tabloids had been sold, but a buyer was not disclosed.[41][42]
In late 2015, AMI paid $30,000 to Dino Sajudin, a doorman atTrump Tower, to obtain the rights to his story in which he alleged Donald Trump had an affair in the 1980s that resulted in the birth of a child. Sajudin in April 2018 identified the woman as Trump's former housekeeper.[43] AMI reporters were given the names of the woman and the alleged child, while Sajudin passed a lie detector test when testifying that he had heard the story from others. Shortly after the payment was made, Pecker ordered the reporters to drop the story.[44] In April 2018, AMI chief content officerDylan Howard denied the story was "spiked" in a so-called "catch and kill" operation, insisting that AMI did not run the story because Sajudin's story lacked credibility.[45] On August 24, 2018, after AMI had released Sajudin from the contract, CNN obtained a copy of it and published excerpts. The contract instructed Sajudin to provide "information regarding Donald Trump's illegitimate child," but did not contain further specifics of Sajudin's story.[46]
In April 2024, Pecker testified in Trump'sNew York criminal trial how the story was his first "catch-and-kill" target during Trump's campaign, with Sajudin also attempting to claim that the child was a girl.[2] A National Enquirer editor who discovered the allegation originally did not know Sajudin's name, but just as a doorman who had worked at Trump.[2] Cohen was the one who discovered the names of the doorman and the alleged maid.[2] Though Cohen at first claimed the story was not true, theNational Enquirer acquired the story for $30,000, which was noticeably higher than the usual $10,000 they paid for stories.[2]
In 2016, AMI paidPlayboy modelKaren McDougal $150,000 for exclusive rights to her allegations of a ten-month affair withDonald Trump—which she claimed happened in 2006–2007, when he was already married toMelania[47]—but AMI never published the story. AMI publicly acknowledged having made the payment afterThe Wall Street Journal revealed it days before the 2016 presidential election, but AMI denied that its purpose had been to "kill damaging stories about" Trump; instead, AMI claimed it had paid only for "exclusive life rights to any relationship [McDougal] has had with a then-married man" and "two years' worth of her fitness columns and magazine covers."[48][49] In March 2018, McDougal filed a lawsuit to invalidate the non-disclosure agreement she had with AMI.[50][51] A month later, AMI settled with McDougal, allowing her to speak about the alleged affair.[52] In August 2018, it was reported that AMI CEO/chairmanDavid Pecker and AMI chief content officerDylan Howard were grantedwitness immunity in exchange for their testimony regarding hush money payments made by Donald Trump's then-personal lawyer,Michael Cohen, in an attempt to influence the 2016 presidential election.[53]
On December 12, 2018, the U.S. Attorney's office announced its agreement with AMI. "AMI admitted that it made the $150,000 payment in concert with a candidate's presidential campaign," the press release said, so that Karen McDougal wouldn't "publicize damaging allegations about the candidate before the 2016 presidential election. AMI further admitted that its principal purpose in making the payment was to suppress the woman's story so as to prevent it from influencing the election." As a result of this agreement, AMI did not face prosecution and agreed to provide extensive assistance to prosecutors about the involvement of Trump and other politicians with the company.[4] The same press release also revealed that Michael Cohen had been sentenced to three years in prison for various crimes, including the $150,000 campaign finance violation—the facilitation of the payment to McDougal—to which he pled guilty on August 21, 2018.[54][55][56] AMI agreed to pay theFederal Election Commission a $187,500 fine in June 2021.[57]
In April 2024, Pecker testified how he, Howard and Cohen conspired to get theNational Enquirer to acquire McDougal's story.[2] Pecker stated that after Howard found out about McDougal's allegation, he sent Howard to California to interview her.[2] During the time Howard met with McDougal, he conversed with Cohen about the situation.[2] Ultimately, McDougal agreed to sell her story to theNational Enquirer for $150,000.[2]
In January 2019, theNational Enquirer broke a story about the extramarital affair ofAmazon founder andWashington Post ownerJeff Bezos withLauren Sánchez. Bezos began investigating how and why the information had been leaked to theNational Enquirer.[58] Trump had long expressed displeasure with Bezos,[59][60][61] and Trump's irritation may have increased due to theWashington Post's critical coverage of the murder (and the subsequent cover-up[62]) of one of its reporters,Jamal Khashoggi.[63] This, Bezos suspects, may have been the political motivation for someone to leak his affair to the tabloid.[64]
On February 7, 2019, Bezos shared emails that he had received the previous day[64] in which AMI sought a public statement from him and his lawyer "affirming that they have no knowledge or basis for suggesting that AM's coverage [of the sexual affair] was politically motivated or influenced by political forces, and an agreement that they will cease referring to such a possibility." AMI chief content officerDylan Howard and his lawyer Jon Fine threatened Bezos, saying that if Bezos did not promptly meet their demands, AMI would publishselfies andsexts sent between Bezos and his girlfriend.[65] Bezos wrote that he would refuse to make this "specific lie" or to otherwise participate in this blackmail bargain that "no real journalists [would] ever propose."[64] "Of course I don't want personal photos published," Bezos added, but he said he chooses to "stand up, roll this log over, and see what crawls out."
That same day,The Washington Post published an article on the matter, quoting a former federal prosecutor who speculated that this news could undermine AMI's recent deal with the government. If prosecutors decide they must file new criminal charges against AMI, the government may not be able "to continue to use them [AMI] to assist other ongoing investigations," said Robert Mintz.[66]
Lauren Sanchez's brother, Michael Sanchez, an ardent Trump supporter, stated he was told by multiple AMI employees that the Enquirer set out to do "a takedown to make Trump happy"[67] andThe Daily Beast reported seeing documents showing that Sanchez believed the Bezos story was run with "President Trump's knowledge and appreciation."[68]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)