This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread concerning an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and pointing viewers to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While the network is hardly a flawless news source, her message seemed accurate to many. It stands as one of the organizations where there exists grounded and largely dependable reporting – notably during crises like the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation During a Business Struggle
Yet CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two huge media corporations battle over ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has become part of a major game of business acquisition, not as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The conjecture about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a more important point.
“The narrative is crafted as a business story with powerful individuals as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.
The Additional Layer: Political Influence
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the shouts 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 White House briefings.
Trump now says that the network requires new ownership. Many see this as a desire for ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
Trump has reason to like that company more. For one thing, it is led 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 installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that storied news network.
A Possibility of Further Turmoil
Significantly, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a guarantee of stability. That arrangement could pave the way for CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.
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 disallow both deals.
“Either merger would be harmful to the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Issue and a Path Forward
Whatever happens regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.
“Our current system is a profoundly system hostile to democracy, but we must resist a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard emphasized. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Will that happen in an era where the top communications regulator will not confirm that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.
Initiatives that support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, finance public media, and prohibit the accumulation of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are vital for a functioning democracy.
In the world of media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN shouldn’t be pieces in the most recent acquisition battle.
