This past Thursday night, amid swirling speculation about an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though CNN is certainly not a flawless news source, her message seemed accurate to many. It stands as one of the organizations where there exists grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – particularly during breaking news situations such as the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State Amid a Corporate Struggle
But CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a vulnerable position as two giant media corporations vie for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the destiny of CNN has turned into a major game of business acquisition, not as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the profound systemic issues with origins in many years of governmental choices,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.
The conjecture about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a larger point.
“It is often framed as a corporate drama with key players as the main characters, but there is scant discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
The Additional Element: The Former President
The CNN scenario is further muddied by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his chief “fake news” adversary.
Remember the chants of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. Many see this as a desire for ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is one reason why he appears to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
He has grounds to like 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 installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that venerable news network.
An Outcome of Further Turmoil
Significantly, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a standalone company. This might be a relief to many at the network, but it’s far from a safe harbor. That setup could set up CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
If you ask Timothy Wu, much of this is against the law, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance recently argued that anti-trust laws should disallow both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be detrimental to the country, and both should be challenged by the government,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Problem and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution regarding CNN, the underlying crisis persists.
“Our current system is a very system hostile to democracy, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard noted. Regulatory choices – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Is this likely in an era where the head of the FCC will not confirm that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.
Policies that support independent news organizations, aid local journalism, fund public media, and outlaw the concentration of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are vital for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pieces in the latest corporate chess match.
