Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation about the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While it is by no means a flawless news source, her statement rang true to many. It stands as one of the organizations where there exists grounded and largely dependable reporting – notably during crises like the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Position Amid a High-Stakes Struggle
Yet the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious position as two huge media corporations compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the future of CNN has become part of a major game of business acquisition, not as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the fundamental flaws with roots in many years of governmental choices,” noted Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Pennsylvania University.
The debate about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“It gets presented as a financial tale with influential figures as the main characters, but there is hardly any discussion of the public interest,” Pickard explained.
A Further Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the chants of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his team's disciplinary revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in official meetings.
Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he seems to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
He has grounds to favor that company more. For one thing, it is led 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 appointed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.
An Outcome of Further Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. Such a move could be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a secure position. That setup could set up CNN for a future sale. The cycle continues.
In the view of Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is against the law, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be bad for the country, and both should be contested by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Challenge and a Potential Solution
No matter the outcome with this particular battle, the larger issue persists.
“Our current system is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard emphasized. Government actions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and revised policy decisions can tackle it.
Is this likely in an era where the top communications regulator won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Reform is a distant prospect now, but that should not imply it will not happen in the future.
Measures that strengthen independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, finance public media, and prohibit the consolidation of media power in very few hands are achievable – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN shouldn’t be tools in the most recent corporate chess match.
