On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation about an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, pointing out the conflicting information and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her words resonated to many. It is one of the outlets where you can find fact-based and generally reliable reporting – especially during fast-moving events like the one taking place in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation During a High-Stakes Struggle
But the news network, now 45 years old, finds itself in a uncertain state as two huge media corporations vie for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the future of CNN has become part of a high-stakes game of mergers and acquisitions, instead of as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the deep structural problems with origins in many years of governmental choices,” said Victor Pickard, writer 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 broader point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with key players as the central actors, but there is very little discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard said.
The Complicating Layer: Donald Trump
The network's predicament is further muddied by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his chief “fake news” adversary.
Remember the chants of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his administration’s punitive withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now claims that CNN needs new ownership. Many see this as a desire for ownership that will protect him from negative coverage and examination. That is a factor in why he appears to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
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, owner of CBS News, also recently appointed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
A Future of Continued Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a standalone company. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a guarantee of stability. That structure could position CNN for another sale. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, a lot of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by regulators,” Wu stated.
The Bigger Issue and a Potential Solution
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the bigger problem persists.
“The present media landscape is a highly structure that undermines democracy, but we shouldn’t give in to learned helplessness,” Pickard emphasized. Policy decisions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Is this likely in an era where the top communications regulator refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Overhaul is a distant prospect now, but that is not to say it will not happen in the future.
Policies that strengthen independent news organizations, aid local journalism, finance public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are not only possible – they are essential for a robust democracy.
Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN shouldn’t be pawns in the most recent corporate chess match.
