This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread concerning the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, noting the confusion and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While CNN is certainly not a flawless news source, her message seemed accurate to many. It is one of the outlets where you can find fact-based and generally trustworthy reporting – particularly during crises like the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable State Amid a High-Stakes Struggle
But CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two massive media empires compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the fate of CNN has turned into a major game of business acquisition, rather than as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of policy decisions,” said Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Penn.
The conjecture about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a more important point.
“It is often framed as a financial tale with powerful individuals as the central actors, but there is scant discussion of the common good,” Pickard added.
The Additional Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is further muddied by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his administration's retaliatory suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now claims that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will shield him from negative coverage and examination. That is part of why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
There is a basis to like that bidder more. For one thing, it is led by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently appointed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
An Outcome of Further Instability
It is important to note, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a separate entity. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a safe harbor. That setup could set up CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal 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 contested by the government,” Wu argued.
The Core Challenge and a Way Ahead
Whatever happens regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.
“The present media landscape is a highly anti-democratic system, but we shouldn’t give in to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this overly commercial monster, and different policy decisions can address it.
Can reform occur in an era where the head of the FCC will not confirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Policies that support independent news organizations, aid local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are necessary for a robust democracy.
Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN must not be pieces in the newest corporate chess match.
