Late Thursday, amid swirling speculation concerning an incident at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and pointing viewers to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Although it is by no means a perfect news source, her message resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the organizations where one can locate fact-based and mostly dependable reporting – notably during fast-moving events like the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Position During a Business Tug-of-War
Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable state as two huge media empires battle over ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Regardless of who wins, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, not as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with roots in many years of policy decisions,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.
The debate about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“It gets presented as a business story with key players as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the common good,” Pickard added.
A Further Layer: Political Influence
The CNN scenario is made more complex by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the chants of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his team's disciplinary withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now claims that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from criticism and scrutiny. That is part of why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
He has grounds to prefer that company more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, owner of CBS News, also recently installed the conservative Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that venerable news network.
A Future of Continued Instability
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a standalone company. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a secure position. That arrangement could position CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.
In the view of Timothy Wu, a lot of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be contested by anti-trust authorities,” Wu stated.
The Fundamental Issue and a Way Ahead
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the larger issue persists.
“What we have now is a profoundly anti-democratic system, but we shouldn’t give in to learned helplessness,” Pickard said. Regulatory choices – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and new policy decisions can fix it.
Is this likely in an era where the head of the FCC won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Overhaul is highly improbable now, but that should not imply it will never happen.
Policies that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the consolidation of media power in a handful of hands are achievable – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.
Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN cannot be tools in the latest merger game.
