Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation about an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her words resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the outlets where you can find reality-based and largely reliable reporting – notably during breaking news situations such as the one developing close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation During a High-Stakes Struggle
But CNN, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a vulnerable state as two giant media corporations vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the future of CNN has been drawn into a major game of business acquisition, not as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the profound systemic issues with origins in decades of regulatory actions,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Penn.
The speculation about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“It is often framed as a business story with influential figures as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.
The Complicating Layer: Political Influence
This situation is complicated by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his chief “fake news” foe.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration's retaliatory revocation 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. You can read that as ownership that will shield him from journalistic oversight. That is a factor in why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
There is a basis to like that company 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, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that storied news network.
A Future of More Uncertainty
It is important to note, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a independent unit. Such a move could be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a guarantee of stability. That setup could set up CNN for another sale. It never ends.
If you ask Timothy Wu, much of this is illegal, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should block both deals.
“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by anti-trust authorities,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Issue and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution regarding CNN, the underlying crisis endures.
“What we have now is a highly anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard said. Regulatory choices – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this overly commercial monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Can reform occur in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that is not to say it will not happen in the future.
Initiatives that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and prevent the concentration of media power in very few hands are achievable – they are necessary for a robust democracy.
In the world of media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations like CNN must not be pawns in the most recent acquisition battle.
