On Thursday evening, amid swirling speculation regarding an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins took to social media, pointing out the conflicting information and pointing viewers to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Although it is by no means a perfect news source, her statement seemed accurate for a lot of people. It remains one of the organizations where one can locate reality-based and largely dependable reporting – notably during crises such as the one developing close to a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State Amid a Corporate Battle
But CNN, now middle-aged, finds itself in a precarious state as two huge media empires compete for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has turned into a high-risk game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what helps the information-seeking public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with roots in many years of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Pennsylvania University.
The speculation about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – will it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.
“It gets presented as a business story with key players as the protagonists, but there is hardly any discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.
The Additional Element: The Former President
This situation is made more complex by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has long portrayed as perhaps his main “fake news” foe.
Recall the chants of “CNN sucks!” at Trump'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 claims that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will shield him from criticism and scrutiny. That is one reason why he seems to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.
Trump has reason to like that suitor more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, parent of CBS News, also recently installed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that historic news network.
An Outcome of Continued Uncertainty
Significantly, if Netflix wins, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a separate entity. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s far from a secure position. That setup could pave the way for CNN for a future sale. The cycle continues.
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 anti-trust laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be detrimental to the country, and both should be contested by the government,” Wu recently wrote.
The Core Issue and a Way Ahead
Whatever happens with this particular battle, the bigger problem remains.
“The present media landscape is a very structure that undermines democracy, but we must resist learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Government actions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to create this profit-obsessed monster, and revised policy decisions can fix it.
Is this likely in an era where the top communications regulator refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Change is a distant prospect now, but that is not to say it will not happen in the future.
Measures that bolster independent news organizations, aid local journalism, finance public media, and outlaw the consolidation of media power in too few hands are achievable – they are essential for a robust democracy.
When it comes to media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations like CNN cannot be tools in the latest merger game.
