Late Thursday, while unconfirmed reports spread concerning the Brown University gunman, the network's Kaitlan Collins took to social media, pointing out the conflicting information and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.
While the network is hardly a perfect news source, her words seemed accurate to many. It remains one of the outlets where there exists fact-based and mostly dependable reporting – notably during fast-moving events such as the one taking place in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable State Amid a Business Tug-of-War
But CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a vulnerable position as two giant media conglomerates vie for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has been drawn into a major game of mergers and acquisitions, instead of as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of regulatory actions,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Penn.
The speculation about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a broader point.
“It is often framed as a business story with influential figures as the main characters, but there is scant discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard explained.
The Additional Layer: The Former President
The network's predicament is made more complex by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his chief “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his team's disciplinary withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from negative coverage and examination. That is part of why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
Trump has reason to favor that bidder more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently placed the conservative Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that venerable news network.
A Future of More Turmoil
Significantly, 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 hardly a safe harbor. That arrangement could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. It never ends.
In the view of Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance recently argued that anti-trust laws should block both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by regulators,” Wu argued.
The Fundamental Challenge and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the underlying crisis persists.
“Our current system is a highly anti-democratic system, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard emphasized. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.
Will that happen 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 is not to say it will be impossible forever.
Measures that strengthen independent news organizations, aid local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in very few hands are within reach – they are vital for a healthy democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN cannot be pawns in the latest acquisition battle.
