On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation regarding the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, noting the confusion and directing people to her network’s 9pm newscast.
Even though it is by no means a perfect news source, her statement resonated for a lot of people. It remains one of the organizations where there exists grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – especially during crises such as the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Situation During a Business Tug-of-War
Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a vulnerable situation as two huge media conglomerates battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
Whatever the outcome, the fate of CNN has been drawn into a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, rather than as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with origins in many years of regulatory actions,” noted Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Pennsylvania University.
The debate about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a broader point.
“It gets presented as a corporate drama with key players as the central actors, but there is scant discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
A Further Factor: Political Influence
This situation is further muddied by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Recall the cries of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive suspension of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his tense exchanges with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now says that the network requires new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will protect him from criticism and scrutiny. That is one reason why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
He has grounds to favor that suitor more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently appointed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that historic news network.
An Outcome of More Turmoil
Notably, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a separate entity. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a secure position. That arrangement could set up CNN for another sale. There is no finish line.
If you ask Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is against the law, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Each proposed deal would be detrimental to the country, and both should be contested by anti-trust authorities,” Wu argued.
The Core Challenge and a Potential Solution
No matter the outcome with this particular battle, the bigger problem persists.
“Our current system is a very anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard noted. Regulatory choices – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this profit-obsessed monster, and different policy decisions can address it.
Is this likely in an era where the top communications regulator refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that is not to say it will not happen in the future.
Initiatives that bolster independent news organizations, aid local journalism, finance public media, and outlaw the concentration of media power in too few hands are achievable – they are vital for a functioning democracy.
Regarding media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations such as CNN shouldn’t be pawns in the most recent corporate chess match.
