On Thursday evening, while unconfirmed reports spread about the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though it is by no means a perfect news source, her message resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the outlets where there exists reality-based and mostly reliable reporting – particularly during fast-moving events such as the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable Situation During a Business Struggle
Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a precarious state as two massive media corporations battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the destiny of CNN has turned into a high-stakes game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with roots in decades of regulatory actions,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.
The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a more important point.
“It is often framed as a corporate drama with key players as the protagonists, but there is hardly any discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
A Further Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is made more complex by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his chief “fake news” antagonist.
Recall the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his team's disciplinary revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now asserts 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 seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason to prefer that company more. For one thing, it is led 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 installed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that storied news network.
An Outcome of Continued Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a separate entity. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a secure position. That arrangement could pave the way for CNN for yet another acquisition. It never ends.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is against the law, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that anti-trust laws should disallow both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be detrimental to the country, and both should be opposed by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.
The Core Challenge and a Way Ahead
No matter the outcome regarding CNN, the underlying crisis endures.
“What we have now is a highly anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard emphasized. Government actions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and new policy decisions can address it.
Will that happen in an era where the top communications regulator refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that should not imply it will never happen.
Measures that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, fund public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in very few hands are within reach – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.
In the world of media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN must not be pieces in the most recent merger game.
