{"id":33406,"date":"2025-07-02T19:49:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-02T19:49:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/33406\/"},"modified":"2025-07-02T19:49:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T19:49:09","slug":"dr-phils-merit-street-jv-files-for-chapter-11-sues-partner-trinity-broadcasting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/33406\/","title":{"rendered":"Dr. Phil\u2019s Merit Street JV Files For Chapter 11, Sues Partner Trinity Broadcasting"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDr. Phil<\/a>\u2019s Fort Worth-based JV Merit Street Media<\/a> filed for Chapter 11 on Wednesday, simultaneously suing business partner Trinity Broadcasting<\/a> for breach of contract that it claims destroyed its new television network and pushed it into bankruptcy.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe TV personality\u2019s high-rated daytime Dr. Phil show ended a 21-year run after the 2022-23 season although it lived on in syndication. The suit centers around his latest venture, Merit Street Media, a JV of McGraw\u2019s Peteski Productions and Trinity Broadcasting Group. The latter was founded by American televangelist Paul Crouch and his wife Jan in 1973 and is currently overseen by president and CEO Matthew Crouch. The network has had carriage on over the air broadcast television as well as multichannel platforms and streaming.<\/p>\n

\n\tA Merit Street spokesperson said, \u201cTrinity Broadcasting Network (TBN)\u00a0is being sued by Merit Street Media (MSM) for failing to provide clearly agreed-upon national distribution and other significant foundational commitments critical to the network\u2019s continuing success and viability. The suit is part of a restructuring proceeding also initiated by MSM.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tA spokesperson for TBN did not immediately return a request for comment.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe JV called for Peteski to provide Merit Street with certain new original episodes of the Dr. Phil show, as well as primetime specials to air on the new TV network. For its part, TBN agreed to provide, at no cost to Merit Street, carriage to distribute Dr. Phil\u2019s shows and specials to a nationwide audience \u2026 in exchange for which TBN would have a controlling equity interest in the network,\u201d according to the lawsuit. <\/p>\n

\n\tTBN also agreed to provide all \u201cfirst class quality\u201d services necessary to produce Dr. Phil\u2019s shows and primetime specials, the suit said.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIn short, the deal was simple and straightforward\u201d \u2014 McGraw\/Peteski contributed content, while TBN contributed access to a distribution network to air Dr. Phil\u2019s content along with the production services to support the creation of that content,\u201d according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\n\tShortly after Merit Street was formed, however, TBN reneged, Merit claimed. It \u201cbegan to abuse its power as a controlling shareholder to advance its own interests and those of its CEO Matthew Crouch, while causing Merit Street to assume responsibility of TBN\u2019s obligations under the Joint Venture Agreement, and to otherwise enrich itself at Merit Street\u2019s expense. The suit accuses TBN of \u201ca conscious, intentional pattern of choices made with full awareness that the consequence of which was to sabotage and seal the fate of a new but already nationally acclaimed network which has, since its launch in April of 2024, delivered its viewers with cutting edge reports, interviews, and in-depth analysis of national importance. This fresh voice on the national stage is inexorably going dark, going off the air because TBN has refused to honor its commitment to transfer its must carry rights and thereby provide national distribution for the network\u2014Merit Street.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSimply put, as a result of TBN\u2019s conduct, \u201cMerit Street has nowhere to send its broadcast signal and nowhere to air its programming no matter how great it may be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSince its launch last year, Merit Street has featured McGraw\u2019s interview with Donald Trump following his conviction on New York state charges, as well as the host\u2019s embed with federal immigration agents back in January.<\/p>\n

\n\tMerit Street says that it will continue to broadcast shows as long as it can, but it will be library programming.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe filing in United States Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Texas estimated Merit Street\u2019s assets at $100-$500 million and liabilities in the same range. Creditors, from 200-999, included distributors like DirecTV and Nexstar and rating agency Nielsen.<\/p>\n

\n\tMerit Street is seeking damages, recoupment of legal costs, and other remedies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dr. Phil\u2019s Fort Worth-based JV Merit Street Media filed for Chapter 11 on Wednesday, simultaneously suing business partner…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":33407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[26973,171,27861,27862,27863,173,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-33406","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-dr-phil","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-merit-street-media","11":"tag-phil-mcgraw","12":"tag-trinity-broadcasting","13":"tag-tv","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114785377712094624","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}