The future of one of America's most recognised news networks, CNN, is caught in a high-stakes corporate tug-of-war, highlighting profound structural flaws within the US media landscape. Rather than focusing on serving the public, the 45-year-old network's fate is being decided as a battle for corporate control between media giants.
A Pawn in a Corporate Game
The immediate conflict centres on the ownership of CNN's parent company, Warner Bros Discovery. Two colossal conglomerates, Netflix and Paramount Skydance, are vying for control. This week, the Warner Bros Discovery board rejected a hostile bid from Paramount Skydance, but regulatory battles loom. Notably, if Netflix prevails, plans indicate CNN and other cable assets would be spun off into a separate entity, potentially setting the stage for yet another sale in the future.
Victor Pickard, a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania and co-author of a new Roosevelt Institute report, argues the public interest is being sidelined. "It gets presented as a business story with powerful individuals as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the public interest," he stated. The speculation over which billionaire or corporation will triumph obscures a more critical issue: an anti-democratic system built on decades of policy choices that favour consolidation and profit.
The Trump Factor and Political Pressure
The situation is further complicated by the shadow of former President Donald Trump, who has long targeted CNN as a primary source of "fake news." Trump has publicly stated CNN needs new ownership, a sentiment widely interpreted as a desire for control that would limit criticism of him. His apparent preference leans toward the Paramount Skydance bid, controlled by David Ellison, son of Trump ally Larry Ellison.
This political dimension was underscored by Paramount's recent installation of right-leaning editor Bari Weiss at CBS News and her subsequent interview with a prominent right-wing figure's widow. The involvement of a potentially sympathetic Trump administration in upcoming regulatory reviews adds another layer of uncertainty to the process.
A System in Need of Reform
Critics like scholar Timothy Wu contend that such mergers should be illegal under existing anti-trust laws, arguing both potential deals would be detrimental to the country. The core problem, however, extends beyond this single acquisition. The US media ecosystem is engineered for corporate profitability and shareholder gain, not for informing the citizenry.
Despite the current climate, with a Federal Communications Commission chair reluctant to affirm the agency's independence, Pickard rejects defeatism. "What we have now is a very anti-democratic system, but we shouldn't give in to learned helplessness," he insists. He points to policy decisions from the 1930s and 1940s that helped create today's hyper-commercialised model, arguing new policies could chart a better course.
The path forward, experts suggest, requires policies that strengthen independent and local journalism, fund public media, and actively prevent excessive concentration of media power. As the battle for CNN demonstrates, in the world of media ownership, bigger isn't better, and treating vital news organisations as corporate pawns undermines the very foundations of a functioning democracy.
