On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation about the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
While it is by no means a perfect news source, her words seemed accurate to many. It stands as one of the organizations where one can locate grounded and largely reliable reporting – especially during breaking news situations like the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State During a Corporate Battle
However the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two massive media empires battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the future of CNN has turned into a major game of corporate ownership, not as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with origins in many years of regulatory actions,” noted Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Pennsylvania University.
The conjecture about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader 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 explained.
The Additional Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is further muddied by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his primary “fake news” adversary.
Think back to the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration's retaliatory withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in official meetings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. Many see this as a desire for ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is one reason why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason 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, owner 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 Possibility of Continued Instability
It is important to note, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a independent unit. Such a move could be a relief to many at the network, but it’s far from a guarantee of stability. That arrangement could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. The cycle continues.
According to Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance stated that anti-trust laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be detrimental to the country, and both should be contested by the government,” Wu stated.
The Fundamental Issue and a Potential Solution
Whatever happens in this situation, the underlying crisis endures.
“The present media landscape is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we shouldn’t give in to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard emphasized. Regulatory choices – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and revised 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? Change is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will not happen in the future.
Policies that strengthen independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are achievable – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations such as CNN must not be tools in the most recent corporate chess match.
