This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread about the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and pointing viewers to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though CNN is certainly not a impeccable news source, her statement seemed accurate to many. It is one of the organizations where one can locate fact-based and largely trustworthy reporting – notably during fast-moving events like the one unfolding close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State During a Business Tug-of-War
But the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious situation as two giant media conglomerates battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the future of CNN has turned into a high-stakes game of business acquisition, instead of as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the profound systemic issues with origins in many years of policy decisions,” said Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The speculation about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.
“It is often framed as a business story with powerful individuals as the central actors, but there is very little discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard added.
A Further Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is complicated by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the chants 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 says that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from criticism and scrutiny. 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 like that bidder more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the ally of Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, owner of CBS News, also recently placed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.
A Possibility of More Instability
Significantly, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. Such a move could be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a safe harbor. That arrangement could position CNN for yet another acquisition. The cycle continues.
In the view of Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is illegal, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that anti-trust laws should prohibit both deals.
“Either merger would be detrimental to the country, and both should be contested by anti-trust authorities,” Wu stated.
The Fundamental Problem and a Way Ahead
Whatever happens regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.
“What we have now is a highly anti-democratic system, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard emphasized. Regulatory choices – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and revised policy decisions can fix it.
Is this likely in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that is not to say it will not happen in the future.
Policies that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, fund public media, and prevent the concentration of media power in very few hands are within reach – they are essential for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations including CNN must not be pawns in the newest merger game.