On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation concerning an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While it is by no means a flawless news source, her words resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the organizations where one can locate grounded and mostly dependable reporting – especially during crises like the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Situation During a High-Stakes Battle
Yet the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a uncertain state as two huge media corporations battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the future of CNN has turned into a high-stakes game of business acquisition, not as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the profound systemic issues with roots in decades of governmental choices,” said Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
The speculation about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“The narrative is crafted as a financial tale with key players as the main characters, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
A Further Factor: Donald Trump
This situation is further muddied by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at Trump's rallies, his team's disciplinary withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in official meetings.
Trump now claims that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from criticism and scrutiny. That is part of why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
There is a basis to like that bidder 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.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that storied news network.
An Outcome of Further Instability
Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a separate entity. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That structure could position CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.
In the view of Timothy Wu, much of this is illegal, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance recently argued that anti-trust laws should prohibit both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Challenge and a Path Forward
No matter the outcome in this situation, the larger issue endures.
“What we have now is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this profit-obsessed monster, and revised policy decisions can fix it.
Can reform occur in an era where the top communications regulator won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Reform is highly improbable now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.
Policies that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and prohibit the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are within reach – they are essential for a functioning democracy.
Regarding media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations like CNN shouldn’t be pieces in the most recent merger game.
