On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation about the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and directing people to her network’s 9pm newscast.
While the network is hardly a perfect news source, her statement seemed accurate to many. It remains one of the outlets where one can locate grounded and largely reliable reporting – notably during fast-moving events such as the one unfolding close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable State Amid a High-Stakes Struggle
But the news network, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two massive media corporations vie for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the future of CNN has become part of a high-risk game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“This represents another instance of the deep structural problems with origins in many years of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The debate about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a larger point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with key players as the main characters, but there is hardly any discussion of the common good,” Pickard explained.
The Additional Factor: Donald Trump
The network's predicament is further muddied by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his main “fake news” foe.
Recall the chants of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration's retaliatory revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now says that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will shield him from negative coverage and examination. That is part of why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
He has grounds to favor 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, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
A Possibility of Further Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a standalone company. Such a move could be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a secure position. That arrangement could position CNN for yet another acquisition. There is no finish line.
In the view of Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is against the law, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be harmful to the country, and both should be challenged by anti-trust authorities,” Wu stated.
The Bigger Issue and a Potential Solution
Whatever happens in this situation, the larger issue remains.
“Our current system is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this overly commercial monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Can reform occur in an era where the head of the FCC will not confirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will not happen in the future.
Policies that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and prohibit the consolidation of media power in a handful of hands are not only possible – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pawns in the newest merger game.
