This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread about the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, noting the confusion and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Although CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her statement resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the broadcasters where you can find grounded and generally reliable reporting – particularly during fast-moving events such as the one developing close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Position During a High-Stakes Battle
Yet the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a uncertain situation as two giant media empires vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the future of CNN has become part of a high-risk game of business acquisition, instead of as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of governmental choices,” noted Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Pennsylvania University.
The conjecture about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a more important point.
“It is often framed as a business story with key players as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard said.
The Complicating Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is complicated by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his main “fake news” foe.
Remember the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now says that the network requires new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will shield him from criticism and scrutiny. That is a factor in why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
There is a basis to prefer that suitor more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the ally of Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, owner of CBS News, also recently installed the conservative Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that venerable news network.
A Possibility of Further Uncertainty
Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a separate entity. This might be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a safe harbor. That setup could pave the way for CNN for a future sale. The cycle continues.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is illegal, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that anti-trust laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be harmful to the country, and both should be challenged by anti-trust authorities,” Wu argued.
The Core Problem and a Potential Solution
Whatever happens in this situation, the underlying crisis remains.
“Our current system is a highly anti-democratic system, but we shouldn’t give in to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this overly commercial monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Will that happen in an era where the head of the FCC refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will be impossible forever.
Measures that support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the consolidation of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are essential for a robust democracy.
In the world of media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations such as CNN must not be tools in the most recent merger game.
