This past Thursday night, while unconfirmed reports spread concerning a shooting at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, highlighting the uncertainty and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.
While it is by no means a perfect news source, her message rang true to many. It stands as one of the outlets where one can locate grounded and generally reliable reporting – particularly during breaking news situations like the one unfolding close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Vulnerable State Amid a High-Stakes Battle
But the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious position as two massive media corporations vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of business acquisition, not as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.
“This is yet another example of the profound systemic issues with origins in many years of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Penn.
The speculation about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a larger point.
“It gets presented as a corporate drama with powerful individuals as the central actors, but there is scant discussion of the common good,” Pickard explained.
A Further Element: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is made more complex by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his primary “fake news” antagonist.
Recall the shouts 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 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 part of why he appears to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.
He has grounds to like that suitor 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 installed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.
A Possibility of More Instability
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a standalone company. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a safe harbor. That arrangement could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. There is no finish line.
In the view of Timothy Wu, much of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should prohibit both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be opposed by anti-trust authorities,” Wu stated.
The Core Problem and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the larger issue remains.
“What we have now is a profoundly structure that undermines democracy, but we shouldn’t give in to learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Government actions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this profit-obsessed monster, and new policy decisions can fix it.
Will that happen in an era where the head of the FCC will not confirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will never happen.
Policies that strengthen independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, subsidize public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in too few hands are achievable – they are vital for a robust democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN shouldn’t be pawns in the most recent merger game.
