Late Thursday, while unconfirmed reports spread regarding a shooting at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins used social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her channel's 9pm newscast.
Even though CNN is certainly not a flawless news source, her statement seemed accurate to many. It is one of the organizations where you can find grounded and generally dependable reporting – especially during crises like the one developing near a New Hampshire storage facility.
A Precarious State During a Business Battle
Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a precarious situation as two massive media empires vie for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.
No matter the result, the fate of CNN has become part of a major game of mergers and acquisitions, not as a question of what benefits the information-seeking public.
“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with origins in decades of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the Penn.
The conjecture about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – is it going to be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – misses a larger point.
“It gets presented as a corporate drama with influential figures as the protagonists, but there is scant discussion of the public interest,” Pickard added.
The Additional Layer: Donald Trump
The CNN scenario is complicated by Donald Trump’s opinions about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his chief “fake news” antagonist.
Think back to the chants of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his team's disciplinary withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his sparring with Collins in press briefings.
Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will shield him from negative coverage and examination. That is one reason why he appears to come down on the side of Paramount Skydance, which has made a hostile bid.
There is a basis to like that bidder more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.
The company, owner of CBS News, also recently appointed the conservative Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that venerable news network.
An Outcome of Continued Turmoil
Significantly, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a independent unit. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s not exactly a secure position. That structure could set up CNN for yet another acquisition. The cycle continues.
According to Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is against the law, anyway. The well-known analyst of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should block both deals.
“Both acquisition attempts would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu stated.
The Core Issue and a Potential Solution
No matter the outcome regarding CNN, the underlying crisis persists.
“What we have now is a profoundly anti-democratic system, but we ought not succumb to learned helplessness,” Pickard noted. Government actions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can address it.
Can reform occur in an era where the top communications regulator will not confirm that the agency is independent? Reform is very unlikely now, but that should not imply it will not happen in the future.
Policies that bolster independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and prohibit the concentration of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are necessary for a functioning democracy.
In the world of media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations like CNN shouldn’t be pawns in the newest merger game.
