Despite striking a deal with Netflix, the high-stakes bidding war for Warner Bros. Discovery shows no sign of cooling off. The company has turned down a renewed offer from Paramount of $30 a share, signaling a continued preference for the Netflix deal that would fetch just over $23 a share.

Whichever bid ultimately prevails, the transaction is expected to draw close regulatory review from the Trump administration.

“Marketplace Morning Report” host David Brancaccio spoke with Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business, about what the deal has to do with the White House. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation.

David Brancaccio: Erik, you teach the course, administrations review deals of this scale to make sure they don't create an unfair monopoly. Biden’s people did it. Trump’s people also seem aware of the power they have over these deals, wouldn't you say?

Erik Gordon: Oh, Trump knows about how antitrust works. In his first administration, he presided over the AT&T-Time Warner deal, which he opposed. In fact, the government sued the companies to block the merger. The government lost and the merger went forward. On the other hand, [Trump] gave a green light to the merger between Sprint and T-Mobile, the two cell phone companies. So he knows about presidential power in deals.

Brancaccio: Let's cut back to Hollywood here. Jump cut — Warner Bros. Discovery. Netflix has offered a lot of money for it, minus old-school cable properties like CNN. Management over there likes the Netflix deal, but then rival Paramount is also dangling a lot of money in a proposed deal that the Warner Bros. people don't like. We don't know what shareholders want yet. We don't know what antitrust regulators might think. And there's the matter of which company the president of the United States likes or doesn't like in this case, right?

Gordon: And that's a little hard to figure out, because President Trump really hates CBS. That's now part of Paramount. He doesn't like CNN. He has been supported by Larry Ellison, who supports the Paramount bid. You sort of wonder, does it depend on what day of the week it is? The president wakes up and says, “Well, today I dislike this side more than I dislike that side,” that could determine the government's position.

Brancaccio: President Biden and many of his predecessors had industrial policy and would intervene sometimes in the private sector and markets sometimes, but this president is very committed to keeping his hands on the lever of the private sector. I mean, he's sometimes talking about ousting CEOs. He had a view on the logo of the Cracker Barrel chain. He doesn't hesitate to get in the center of it.

Gordon: I mean, he, in his way, intervenes in things where sometimes you're surprised he even notices them. President Biden actually intervened a lot, but it seemed to be more as a matter of broad policy. Sometimes with Mr. Trump, it just seems to be what caught his attention or what he's personally interested in, and that's a really different use of the presidency.