Late Thursday, while unconfirmed reports spread about a shooting at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, pointing out the conflicting information and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though the network is hardly a perfect news source, her message seemed accurate for a lot of people. It stands as one of the organizations where there exists reality-based and mostly reliable reporting – notably during breaking news situations such as the one unfolding in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Situation Amid a Business Tug-of-War
However the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a precarious situation as two massive media conglomerates battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a high-risk game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with roots in many years of regulatory actions,” noted Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the University of Pennsylvania.
The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with influential figures as the main characters, but there is scant discussion of the public interest,” Pickard explained.
The Complicating Layer: Political Influence
This situation is further muddied by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his primary “fake news” foe.
Recall the cries of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his administration’s punitive revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is one reason why he appears to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
He has grounds 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.
The company, parent of CBS News, also recently appointed the conservative Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that storied news network.
A Possibility of Continued Instability
It is important to note, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. Such a move could be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a safe harbor. That setup could position CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is illegal, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should prohibit both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be detrimental to the country, and both should be opposed by anti-trust authorities,” Wu recently wrote.
The Bigger Challenge and a Path Forward
No matter the outcome in this situation, the underlying crisis persists.
“Our current system is a very anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can address it.
Is this likely in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that is not to say it will never happen.
Initiatives that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and prohibit the accumulation of media power in too few hands are achievable – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pawns in the most recent merger game.
