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On Thursday evening, as rumors swirled about an incident at Brown University, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins posted on social media, noting the confusion and guiding the public to her network’s 9pm newscast.

Even though the network is hardly a impeccable news source, her words seemed accurate for a lot of people. It is one of the outlets where one can locate grounded and largely trustworthy reporting – notably during breaking news situations like the one taking place in the vicinity of a New Hampshire storage facility.

A Precarious Position During a High-Stakes Battle

Yet the news network, now four and a half decades old, finds itself in a uncertain position as two giant media conglomerates battle over ownership of its corporate owner, Warner Bros Discovery.

Regardless of who wins, the destiny of CNN has been drawn into a major game of mergers and acquisitions, rather than as a question of what serves the information-seeking public.

“This is yet another example of the deep structural problems with roots in decades of regulatory actions,” stated Victor Pickard, author of “Democracy Without Journalism?” and a media policy professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

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

“It is often framed as a business story with powerful individuals as the central actors, but there is very little discussion of the public interest,” Pickard explained.

The Complicating Element: Political Influence

The CNN scenario is further muddied by Donald Trump’s longstanding stance about a network he has consistently labeled as perhaps his main “fake news” antagonist.

Remember the shouts of “CNN sucks!” at the president’s rallies, his team's disciplinary revocation of reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials, or his clashes with Collins in press briefings.

Trump now claims that CNN needs new ownership. You can read that as ownership that will insulate him from journalistic oversight. That is part of why he appears to favor Paramount Skydance, which has made a aggressive takeover attempt.

There is a basis to prefer that bidder more. For one thing, it is run by David Ellison, son of the Trump-friendly Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people.

The company, owner 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 Future of More Instability

Significantly, if Netflix wins, 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 not exactly a secure position. That arrangement could pave the way for CNN for another sale. The cycle continues.

In the view of Timothy Wu, a great deal of this is illegal, anyway. The influential voice of big tech’s dominance stated that competition laws should disallow both deals.

“Each proposed deal would be harmful to the country, and both should be contested by the government,” Wu recently wrote.

The Bigger Problem and a Path Forward

No matter the outcome in this situation, the bigger problem endures.

“What we have now is a highly system hostile to democracy, but we must resist a sense of powerlessness,” Pickard noted. Policy decisions – originating in the 1930s and 1940s – helped to foster this hyper-commercialized monster, and different policy decisions can tackle it.

Will that happen in an era where the top communications regulator will not confirm that the agency is independent? Overhaul is highly improbable now, but that doesn’t mean it will not happen in the future.

Measures that support independent news organizations, bolster local journalism, finance public media, and outlaw the accumulation of media power in a handful of hands are within reach – they are necessary for a robust democracy.

In the world of media ownership, size does not equal quality. And news organizations like CNN must not be pieces in the newest merger game.