Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation regarding an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Although CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her words resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the organizations where there exists fact-based and mostly reliable reporting – especially during fast-moving events like the one unfolding in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Position Amid a Corporate Struggle
Yet CNN, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a precarious situation as two massive media corporations compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the future of CNN has turned into a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, rather than as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“This represents another instance of the profound systemic issues with roots in decades of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Pennsylvania University.
The debate about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a more important point.
“It gets presented as a business story with powerful individuals as the main characters, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
The Additional Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is made more complex by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his primary “fake news” foe.
Recall the cries 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 asserts that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
Trump has reason to like that suitor more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, owner of CBS News, also recently appointed the conservative Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
A Future of More Uncertainty
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a separate entity. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That structure could set up CNN for a future sale. The cycle continues.
If you ask Timothy Wu, much of this is against the law, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should prohibit both deals.
“Either merger would be harmful to the country, and both should be contested by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Challenge and a Potential Solution
Regardless of the resolution regarding CNN, the bigger problem persists.
“What we have now is a highly system hostile to democracy, but we shouldn’t give in to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard noted. Regulatory choices – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Will that happen in an era where the head of the FCC refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Reform is a distant prospect now, but that is not to say it will be impossible forever.
Measures that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the consolidation of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are vital for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations including CNN shouldn’t be pieces in the most recent acquisition battle.
