This past Thursday night, as rumors swirled about the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though the network is hardly a flawless news source, her statement seemed accurate to many. It remains one of the organizations where one can locate grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – especially during crises like the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
An Uncertain Situation During a High-Stakes Battle
However CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a vulnerable position as two massive media empires compete for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has turned into a major game of business acquisition, not as a question of what serves the news-consuming public.
“This represents another instance of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of policy decisions,” said Victor Pickard, writer 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? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“It gets presented as a corporate drama with powerful individuals as the protagonists, but there is scant discussion of the common good,” Pickard added.
A Further Factor: The Former President
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his chief “fake news” foe.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now claims that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is a factor in why he seems to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
He has grounds to prefer 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, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the top editor of that storied news network.
A Future of Further Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a independent unit. Such a move could be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That setup could pave the way for CNN for another sale. It never ends.
In the view of 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 disallow both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be challenged by anti-trust authorities,” Wu argued.
The Bigger Challenge and a Potential Solution
Whatever happens regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.
“The present media landscape is a very system hostile to democracy, but we shouldn’t give in to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard emphasized. Government actions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this hyper-commercialized monster, and new policy decisions can address it.
Is this likely in an era where the head of the FCC won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will never happen.
Measures that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, fund public media, and prohibit the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are achievable – they are necessary for a functioning democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pieces in the newest merger game.
