This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread regarding a shooting at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While the network is hardly a perfect news source, her message rang true for numerous observers. It remains one of the organizations where you can find fact-based and mostly reliable reporting – especially during breaking news situations like the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain State Amid a High-Stakes Tug-of-War
However the news network, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two huge media conglomerates battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has become part of a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, rather than as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the profound systemic issues with roots in decades of regulatory actions,” said Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The conjecture about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.
“It gets presented as a corporate drama with powerful individuals as the main characters, but there is hardly any discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard said.
A Further Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is further muddied by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his chief “fake news” adversary.
Recall the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from negative coverage and examination. That is a factor in why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason to like that company more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, owner of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
A Possibility of More Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a separate entity. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a safe harbor. That arrangement could position CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance stated that anti-trust laws should prohibit both deals.
“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu stated.
The Bigger Challenge and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the underlying crisis remains.
“The present media landscape is a highly system hostile to democracy, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this overly commercial monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Can reform occur in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Measures that strengthen independent news organizations, aid local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the concentration of media power in very few hands are achievable – they are vital for a functioning democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN shouldn’t be tools in the newest corporate chess match.
