On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation concerning an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and directing people to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though it is by no means a perfect news source, her message rang true to many. It remains one of the outlets where you can find grounded and mostly dependable reporting – notably during breaking news situations like the one unfolding in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Position During a High-Stakes Battle
But the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a uncertain state as two massive media conglomerates battle over ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a high-risk game of corporate ownership, not as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of regulatory actions,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Pennsylvania University.
The debate about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a larger point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with key players as the main characters, but there is very little discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard said.
The Complicating Layer: Political Influence
This situation is made more complex by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his main “fake news” adversary.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his administration’s punitive revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now says that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will protect him from criticism and scrutiny. That is one reason why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
Trump has reason to like that bidder more. For one thing, it is led by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, parent of CBS News, also recently appointed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that historic news network.
A Possibility of More Instability
Significantly, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a standalone company. This might be a relief to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a guarantee of stability. That structure could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. The cycle continues.
In the view of Timothy Wu, much of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance recently argued that anti-trust laws should disallow both deals.
“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu argued.
The Core Issue and a Way Ahead
Regardless of the resolution with this particular battle, the bigger problem endures.
“Our current system is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and revised policy decisions can address it.
Can reform occur in an era where the head of the FCC refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will be impossible forever.
Policies that support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, finance public media, and prevent the concentration of media power in a handful of hands are within reach – they are essential for a robust democracy.
In the world of media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN cannot be pawns in the newest merger game.
