On Thursday evening, as rumors swirled regarding an incident at Brown University, the network's Kaitlan Collins used social media, pointing out the conflicting information and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though the network is hardly a flawless news source, her words resonated for a lot of people. It is one of the broadcasters where one can locate fact-based and largely trustworthy reporting – particularly during crises such as the one developing in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State Amid a High-Stakes Tug-of-War
However CNN, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a precarious state as two massive media empires compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has become part of a high-risk game of corporate ownership, rather than as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of governmental choices,” noted Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Penn.
The debate about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a larger point.
“It gets presented as a financial tale with key players as the central actors, but there is hardly any discussion of the public interest,” Pickard explained.
A Further Element: Political Influence
The network's predicament is made more complex by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the chants of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his team's disciplinary revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. Many see this as a desire for ownership that will insulate him from criticism and scrutiny. That is part of why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
There is a basis to like 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.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the conservative Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that historic news network.
A Future of More Uncertainty
It is important to note, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a independent unit. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a guarantee of stability. That structure could pave the way for CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a lot of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should prohibit both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be contested by the government,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Challenge and a Potential Solution
Regardless of the resolution regarding CNN, the larger issue remains.
“What we have now is a very anti-democratic system, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Is this likely in an era where the head of the FCC won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is a distant prospect now, but that doesn’t mean it will be impossible forever.
Measures that support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the concentration of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are essential for a functioning democracy.
In the world of media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations such as CNN must not be tools in the newest merger game.
