This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread regarding the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and pointing viewers to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though the network is hardly a impeccable news source, her message seemed accurate for numerous observers. It remains one of the broadcasters where you can find fact-based and mostly trustworthy reporting – notably during fast-moving events such as the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State Amid a Business Tug-of-War
However CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two massive media conglomerates vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the destiny of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of mergers and acquisitions, instead of as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the deep structural problems with origins in many years of regulatory actions,” noted Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the University of Pennsylvania.
The debate about who will own Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a more important point.
“The narrative is crafted as a financial tale with key players as the central actors, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard said.
A Further Layer: Donald Trump
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” foe.
Think back to the cries of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration's retaliatory suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now claims that the network requires new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will insulate him from criticism and scrutiny. That is part of why he seems to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
Trump has reason to like that company more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that venerable news network.
An Outcome of More Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a separate entity. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s hardly a guarantee of stability. That arrangement could set up CNN for another sale. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be contested by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.
The Fundamental Issue and a Way Ahead
Whatever happens with this particular battle, the underlying crisis persists.
“The present media landscape is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard emphasized. Regulatory choices – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and revised policy decisions can address it.
Can reform occur in an era where the top communications regulator won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that is not to say it will never happen.
Measures that strengthen independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, fund public media, and outlaw the concentration of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are necessary for a functioning democracy.
Regarding media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN shouldn’t be pieces in the newest corporate chess match.