This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread about a shooting at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Although CNN is certainly not a flawless news source, her message seemed accurate to many. It is one of the outlets where you can find reality-based and mostly dependable reporting – especially during crises like the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Position Amid a Business Battle
However the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious situation as two huge media empires compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a major game of corporate ownership, instead of as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of governmental choices,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Pennsylvania University.
The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a more important point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with influential figures as the protagonists, but there is hardly any discussion of the public interest,” Pickard explained.
A Further Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is made more complex by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his chief “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration’s punitive withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now says that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he appears to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
There is a basis to prefer that bidder more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, owner of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that venerable news network.
A Possibility of Further Instability
Significantly, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That setup could position CNN for yet another acquisition. There is no finish line.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance stated that anti-trust laws should block both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be challenged by anti-trust authorities,” Wu stated.
The Core Challenge and a Potential Solution
No matter the outcome regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.
“What we have now is a very anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this overly commercial monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Can reform occur in an era where the head of the FCC won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that is not to say it will never happen.
Initiatives that strengthen independent news organizations, aid local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in very few hands are achievable – they are vital for a healthy democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN must not be tools in the newest merger game.
