This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread concerning the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins used social media, pointing out the conflicting information and pointing viewers to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While the network is hardly a flawless news source, her words rang true to many. It stands as one of the outlets where you can find reality-based and mostly reliable reporting – notably during fast-moving events like the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation During a Business Battle
Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two giant media conglomerates compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the future of CNN has been drawn into a major game of business acquisition, rather than as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with roots in decades of regulatory actions,” noted Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the University of Pennsylvania.
The speculation about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a more important point.
“It gets presented as a financial tale with key players as the central actors, but there is scant discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.
The Complicating Element: The Former President
This situation is made more complex by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration’s punitive revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now says that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is one reason why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
He has grounds to like that suitor 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, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.
A Possibility of Further Uncertainty
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a standalone company. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a secure position. That structure could pave the way for CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should block both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by regulators,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Issue and a Path Forward
No matter the outcome with this particular battle, the underlying crisis endures.
“Our current system is a highly anti-democratic system, but we shouldn’t give in to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this hyper-commercialized monster, and new 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 support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, finance public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are not only possible – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations such as CNN shouldn’t be tools in the most recent corporate chess match.
