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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 directing people to her network’s 9pm newscast.

While CNN is certainly not a flawless news source, her statement resonated to many. It stands as one of the organizations where one can locate fact-based and largely reliable reporting – especially during fast-moving events such as the one unfolding near a New Hampshire storage facility.

An Uncertain Position During a Corporate Tug-of-War

Yet CNN, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a precarious state as two giant media empires compete for ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.

Whatever the outcome, the future of CNN has become part of a major game of corporate ownership, not as a question of what helps the information-seeking public.

“This is yet another example of the fundamental flaws with origins in decades of policy decisions,” stated Victor Pickard, writer of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a professor of media policy at the University of Pennsylvania.

The speculation about which company will control Warner Bros Discovery – could it be Netflix or Paramount Skydance? – fails to grasp a broader point.

“It is often framed as a corporate drama with influential figures as the protagonists, but there is scant discussion of the common good,” Pickard said.

The Additional Factor: The Former President

The network's predicament is further muddied by Donald Trump’s views about a network he has frequently denounced as perhaps his chief “fake news” adversary.

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

Trump now claims that the network requires new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will shield him from negative coverage and examination. That is part of why he appears to support Paramount Skydance, which has made a unsolicited offer.

He has grounds to prefer that suitor more. For one thing, it is controlled by David Ellison, son of the pro-Trump Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.

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

A Future of More Turmoil

Notably, if Netflix is successful, CNN and other cable outlets would first be spun off into a standalone company. That would be a relief to many at the network, but it’s far from a safe harbor. That arrangement could pave the way for CNN for a future sale. It never ends.

According to Timothy Wu, a lot of this is illegal, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance wrote recently that competition laws should disallow both deals.

“Either merger would be bad for the country, and both should be opposed by anti-trust authorities,” Wu recently wrote.

The Bigger Problem and a Potential Solution

Whatever happens with this particular battle, the underlying crisis remains.

“Our current system is a highly system hostile to democracy, but we ought not succumb to the belief that change is impossible,” Pickard emphasized. Government actions – from the 1930s and 1940s – helped to build this overly commercial monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.

Can reform occur in an era where the top communications regulator won’t even affirm that the agency is independent? Change is highly improbable now, but that doesn’t mean it will be impossible forever.

Initiatives that bolster independent news organizations, aid local journalism, finance public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in very few hands are within reach – they are vital for a healthy democracy.

Regarding media ownership, larger is not superior. And news organizations such as CNN must not be pieces in the newest acquisition battle.