‘National Enquirer’ for sale as it feels heat from its own scandals

FLORIDA: The owner of the National Enquirer says it is considering selling the tabloid, which has admitted to paying hush money to help US President Donald Trump get elected and has been accused of attempting to blackmail Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

American Media Inc (AMI) said on Wednesday that it was looking at “strategic options” for the weekly, as well as for the Globe and National Examiner brands.

“We feel the future opportunities with the tabloids can be best exploited by a different ownership,” the company said in a statement.

Last year, AMI cooperated with federal prosecutors to avoid charges and admitted making a US$150,000 (RM615,470) hush money payment to a former Playboy magazine model to stop her from going public ahead of the 2016 election with claims that she had an affair with Trump.

The incident involved a practice called “catch and kill”, in which the tabloid bought rights to a story but never published the potentially damaging information.

David Pecker, chief executive of American Media, has been a longtime Trump ally and has described the president as a “personal friend”.

Trump and his lawyers say the payments were a personal matter unrelated to the election.

More recently, the National Enquirer has been embroiled in a battle with Bezos, the chief executive officer of Amazon.com Inc and owner of the Washington Post.

The world’s richest man, who has frequently been a target of ire from Trump, has accused the publication of trying to blackmail him with the threat of publishing intimate photos.

Over its 92-year history, the National Enquirer has enticed readers in supermarket checkout lines with sensational headlines and photos about celebrities.

Its website claims it reaches an audience of five million.