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Senator Elizabeth Warren and fellow Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to the US Department of Justice on July 17, pressing for an impartial antitrust review of Fox Corp.’s planned $22 billion acquisition of Roku. The deal, announced on June 15, would marry one of America’s largest media conglomerates with the streaming hardware and platform company that sits in tens of millions of living rooms.
The core concern is straightforward: when the company that owns the content also owns the platform delivering it, the temptation to play favorites isn’t exactly subtle. Lawmakers worry that Fox could steer Roku users toward its own programming, particularly content from Tubi, the free ad-supported streaming service Fox acquired six years ago, at the expense of competing services.
What the deal looks like
Under the proposed terms, Roku shareholders would receive $96 in cash plus 0.9693 shares of Fox Class A stock for each Roku share they hold. That works out to roughly an 11% premium.
The combined entity would become the third-largest US television business by viewing share. Fox has pledged to keep Roku an open platform after the merger closes.
Fox expects to close the deal in the first half of 2027, pending regulatory approval.
Why Democrats are worried
The congressional letter highlights several specific risks. First, the sheer scale: the combined Fox-Roku entity would reach approximately 100 million US households.
Second, there’s the competition angle in ad-supported streaming. Tubi has grown into a legitimate player in the free streaming space, competing against services like Pluto TV, Peacock’s free tier, and Amazon’s Freevee. If Roku’s platform algorithms or homepage real estate suddenly started favoring Tubi content, those competitors would lose a critical distribution channel overnight.
Third, lawmakers raised broader concerns about media consolidation. The letter from Congress also touches on platform neutrality, noting that Roku functions as a digital gatekeeper through which millions of Americans choose what to watch. Handing that gatekeeper role to a company with its own content interests creates an inherent conflict.
The bigger picture for media and markets
Fox’s move to acquire Roku reflects a broader strategic shift among traditional media companies. Fox already took a step in this direction with its Tubi acquisition, which gave it a foothold in free streaming. Roku would give it the operating system and interface layer that sits between viewers and every streaming app on their TV.
Fox’s pledge to maintain Roku as an open platform will likely become the central battleground of any regulatory negotiation. The DOJ could potentially approve the deal with behavioral conditions, requiring Fox to prove it isn’t tilting Roku’s platform in its own favor. Behavioral remedies have a mixed track record in antitrust enforcement, as they are notoriously difficult to monitor and enforce once the merged company is operating as a single entity.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
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