This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread about a shooting at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, pointing out the conflicting information and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though CNN is certainly not a perfect news source, her statement rang true for a lot of people. It stands as one of the broadcasters where one can locate reality-based and mostly reliable reporting – especially during breaking news situations like the one taking place close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation Amid a Business Struggle
Yet the news network, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable state as two giant media corporations compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the destiny of CNN has been drawn into a major game of corporate ownership, instead of as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of regulatory actions,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Pennsylvania University.
The debate about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a larger point.
“The narrative is crafted as a corporate drama with key players as the central actors, but there is hardly any discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard added.
The Complicating Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” adversary.
Recall the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his administration's retaliatory revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now says that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will shield him from criticism and scrutiny. That is a factor in why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
Trump has reason to like that company more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, owner of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that storied news network.
A Possibility of More Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a separate entity. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a secure position. That arrangement could position CNN for a future sale. There is no finish line.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be bad for the country, and both should be contested by the government,” Wu recently wrote.
The Bigger Issue and a Way Ahead
No matter the outcome in this situation, the bigger problem remains.
“What we have now is a highly anti-democratic system, but we must resist the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and new policy decisions can tackle it.
Will that happen in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will never happen.
Initiatives that strengthen independent news organizations, aid local journalism, fund public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in too few hands are within reach – they are vital for a robust democracy.
In the world of media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations including CNN cannot be pawns in the most recent corporate chess match.
