On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation concerning a shooting at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and pointing viewers to her network’s 9pm newscast.
While CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her words rang true to many. It stands as one of the organizations where there exists grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – notably during fast-moving events such as the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Position During a Corporate Tug-of-War
However the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious situation as two huge media conglomerates vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the future of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, instead of as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“This represents another instance of the fundamental flaws with origins in many years of regulatory actions,” said Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Penn.
The speculation about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a larger point.
“It gets presented as a business story with key players as the central actors, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard said.
A Further Factor: Donald Trump
This situation is made more complex by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration’s punitive withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in official meetings.
Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from negative coverage and examination. That is part of why he seems to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason to favor that suitor 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, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that historic news network.
An Outcome of More Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a separate entity. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a guarantee of stability. That setup could position CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
In the view of Timothy Wu, much of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should prohibit both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be bad for the country, and both should be challenged by the government,” Wu recently wrote.
The Bigger Problem and a Potential Solution
No matter the outcome in this situation, the larger issue persists.
“What we have now is a very anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard noted. Government actions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can fix it.
Can reform occur in an era where the head of the FCC will not confirm that the agency is independent? Overhaul is highly improbable now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Initiatives that strengthen independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, subsidize public media, and prohibit the accumulation of media power in very few hands are achievable – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN cannot be tools in the latest acquisition battle.
