Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation concerning the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and directing people to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though it is by no means a flawless news source, her message seemed accurate to many. It is one of the organizations where one can locate reality-based and mostly reliable reporting – especially during fast-moving events such as the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State Amid a Corporate Battle
But CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two giant media empires battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of mergers and acquisitions, instead of as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with roots in decades of policy decisions,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.
The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.
“The narrative is crafted as a financial tale with powerful individuals as the main characters, but there is very little discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.
The Additional Factor: Political Influence
This situation is further muddied by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” foe.
Think back to the cries of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his administration's retaliatory suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in official meetings.
Trump now says that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from negative coverage and examination. That is a factor in why he appears to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
Trump has reason to favor that suitor more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.
A Future of Further Uncertainty
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a independent unit. Such a move could be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a safe harbor. That setup could position CNN for yet another acquisition. It never ends.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should block both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be detrimental to the country, and both should be contested by anti-trust authorities,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Challenge and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the underlying crisis persists.
“What we have now is a very anti-democratic system, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard said. Government actions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this profit-obsessed monster, and revised policy decisions can fix it.
Will that happen in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair will not confirm that the agency is independent? Overhaul is a distant prospect now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Measures that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the consolidation of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations including CNN must not be pieces in the latest acquisition battle.
