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On Thursday evening, while unconfirmed reports spread about an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and directing people to her channel's 9pm newscast.

While it is by no means a flawless news source, her statement seemed accurate for numerous observers. It stands as one of the organizations where one can locate grounded and generally dependable reporting – notably during fast-moving events like the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.

A Precarious Position During a Corporate Struggle

Yet CNN, now 45 years old, finds itself in a precarious position as two giant media conglomerates compete for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.

No matter the result, the future of CNN has turned into a major game of corporate ownership, not as a question of what benefits the news-consuming public.

“Here is one more case of the deep structural problems with roots in decades of governmental choices,” noted Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a academic specializing in media policy at the Penn.

The debate about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a more important point.

“It gets presented as a corporate drama with key players as the main characters, but there is hardly any discussion of the common good,” Pickard explained.

A Further Element: Donald Trump

The CNN scenario is made more complex by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his primary “fake news” foe.

Remember the chants of “CNN sucks!” at his rallies, his administration’s punitive withdrawal of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in press briefings.

Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he appears to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.

Trump has reason to prefer that bidder more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.

Paramount, parent of CBS News, also recently placed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, famous for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that storied news network.

A Possibility of Continued Instability

It is important to note, if Netflix prevails, CNN and other cable outlets would first be separated into a standalone company. This might be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a safe harbor. That arrangement could set up CNN for a future sale. The cycle continues.

In the view of Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is a violation of antitrust statutes, anyway. The prominent critic of big tech’s dominance recently argued that competition laws should disallow both deals.

“Each proposed deal would be bad for the country, and both should be challenged by regulators,” Wu recently wrote.

The Core Issue and a Path Forward

Regardless of the resolution regarding CNN, the larger issue endures.

“The present media landscape is a very anti-democratic system, but we shouldn’t give in to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard emphasized. Policy decisions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this profit-obsessed monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.

Will that happen in an era where the Federal Communications Commission chair refuses to acknowledge that the agency is independent? Overhaul is a distant prospect now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.

Measures that bolster independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, subsidize public media, and prevent the consolidation of media power in too few hands are within reach – they are necessary for a healthy democracy.

When it comes to media ownership, bigger isn’t better. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pawns in the most recent corporate chess match.