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This past Thursday night, amid swirling speculation about the Brown University gunman, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, highlighting the uncertainty and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.

While the network is hardly a flawless news source, her message rang true to many. It is one of the organizations where one can locate grounded and generally reliable reporting – notably during fast-moving events such as the one taking place close to a New Hampshire storage facility.

A Vulnerable Position Amid a High-Stakes Battle

Yet the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a vulnerable position as two giant media corporations compete for ownership of its parent company, Warner Bros Discovery.

Whatever the outcome, the destiny of CNN has turned into a high-stakes game of mergers and acquisitions, instead of as a question of what helps the news-consuming public.

“This represents another instance of the profound systemic issues with origins in decades of governmental choices,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the Penn.

The conjecture about the future owner of Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – overlooks a broader point.

“It is often framed as a corporate drama with influential figures as the protagonists, but there is very little discussion of the societal benefit,” Pickard explained.

The Complicating Factor: Political Influence

This situation is complicated by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his chief “fake news” antagonist.

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

Trump now asserts that CNN needs new ownership. This can be interpreted as ownership that will protect him from journalistic oversight. That is a factor in 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 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 placed the right-leaning Bari Weiss, known for her “anti-woke” beliefs, as the lead editor of that historic news network.

An Outcome of Continued Uncertainty

Significantly, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be carved out into a independent unit. That would be a welcome development to many at the network, but it’s hardly a guarantee of stability. That arrangement could set up CNN for another sale. It never ends.

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

“Either merger would be detrimental to the country, and both should be opposed by the government,” Wu recently wrote.

The Core Issue and a Way Ahead

Regardless of the resolution with this particular battle, the underlying crisis remains.

“Our current system is a very system hostile to democracy, but we ought not succumb to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – dating back to the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.

Is this likely in an era where the head of the FCC won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Overhaul is a distant prospect now, but that should not imply it will be impossible forever.

Policies that support independent news organizations, reinforce local journalism, finance public media, and prevent the consolidation of media power in too few hands are not only possible – they are necessary for a robust democracy.

Regarding media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations including CNN must not be pawns in the latest acquisition battle.