Late Thursday, as rumors swirled regarding a shooting 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.
While CNN is certainly not a impeccable news source, her words resonated to many. It is one of the organizations where one can locate fact-based and generally trustworthy reporting – particularly during breaking news situations like the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious Position During a High-Stakes Tug-of-War
But the news network, now middle-aged, finds itself in a uncertain position as two huge media empires vie for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the destiny of CNN has become part of a high-stakes game of corporate ownership, instead of as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.
“This is yet another example of the fundamental flaws with roots in decades of policy decisions,” said Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.
The debate about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.
“It is often framed as a financial tale with influential figures as the main characters, but there is hardly any discussion of the common good,” Pickard added.
A Further Factor: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.
Remember the cries of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his team's disciplinary withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in White House briefings.
Trump now asserts that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. 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 prefer that company 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 appointed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, noted for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the editor-in-chief of that venerable news network.
An Outcome of Further Uncertainty
Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a standalone company. This might be a relief to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That structure could pave the way for CNN for a future sale. It never ends.
According to Timothy Wu, a lot of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should disallow both deals.
“Either merger would be harmful to the country, and both should be challenged by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.
The Bigger Issue and a Path Forward
Regardless of the resolution in this situation, the underlying crisis endures.
“The present media landscape is a very anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard said. Policy decisions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can fix it.
Will that happen in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.
Initiatives that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and prevent the accumulation of media power in very few hands are not only possible – they are essential for a robust democracy.
Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations like CNN cannot be pieces in the latest corporate chess match.
