Why CNN Might Be in Too Much Trouble to Fix

Who wants to be CEO of CNN, anyway? The question sounds like the premise of a very confusing game show in which the biggest winner is simultaneously the biggest loser. The onetime top-dog cable news network is consistently outrated by Fox News these days, and has struggled to remain relevant amid increased political polarization and dwindling cable subscriptions. Its corporate parent, Warner Bros. Discovery, is run by numbers grouch David Zaslav, whose primary interest in journalism seems to be his desire to stop its practitioners from saying mean things about him. The CNN job in this late-cable era seems tailor-made for a masochist or an idiot—which is why, when the position opened up earlier this year, I fully expected Zaslav to fill it with some anonymous Wambsganian yes man to be charged solely with cutting costs and trimming staff while steering the network slowly but surely toward the allegedly reasonable right.

In other words, CNN could have done a hell of a lot worse than Mark Thompson, the veteran media executive who was announced as the network’s new CEO and editor in chief earlier this week. Thompson is neither an idiot nor a masochist, as far as I know; he’s a well-respected news leader with a blue-chip résumé who will immediately enjoy credibility in the newsroom while commanding respect from the boardroom. (It probably doesn’t hurt that the British native is technically Sir Mark Thompson, having been knighted earlier this year.) Unlike his CNN predecessor, Chris Licht, who had never run a news organization before taking charge of the network in 2022, Thompson has helmed both the BBC and the New York Times—two of the only news outlets anywhere that rival or eclipse CNN in terms of resources, influence, and reputation. Licht had a vision for CNN’s future, but he struggled mightily with implementing it, and was ultimately axed only 13 months after taking the job, a fate he surely hastened by agreeing to cooperate with a ruinous Atlantic profile. Although Thompson’s vision for CNN as of yet remains hazy, his résumé should buy him one advantage that Licht never had: time.

And yet all the time in the world still might not be enough to save CNN, which is in a much worse position than were either of Thompson’s two previous Big Media employers when he worked there. The BBC has heretofore been uniquely insulated from the disruptive effects of the new media revolution insofar as it makes most of its budget not via carriage fees or ad revenue but from an annual license fee imposed by royal charter on all U.K. households that watch live television. (The current BBC Charter expires at the end of 2027, and it is not a given that the license fee will be renewed after that.) And although the New York Times was certainly never assured of making it through the news revenue crisis that accompanied the rise of Web 2.0, its survival odds were greatly enhanced by its preeminent stature among American national newspapers, as well as its mission-driven leadership from the family that has controlled the Times for generations. Thompson deserves credit for capably shepherding the Times and the BBC during his stints at each outlet, but it’s also fair to recognize that “Don’t screw this up for us” is a very different brief than “Save us, Mark Thompson, you’re our only hope.”

To be fair, CNN isn’t an entirely distressed asset. The network boasts vast brand recognition, an immense newsgathering apparatus, the glistening star power of Anderson Cooper, and the support of countless hotel-lobby televisions that will tune in 24/7 no matter what’s on the air. But CNN doesn’t have a Sulzberger family to vouchsafe the network’s journalistic values, it doesn’t have a giant pot of government licensing money to play with, and it doesn’t even have the sorts of ratings numbers that might justify its inflated reputation as the last word in televised news. The network is a cog in the Warner Bros Discovery corporate portfolio, and Thompson ultimately answers to the bottom line–focused Zaslav, who in April 2022 killed the network’s much-touted CNN+ streaming service within weeks of its launch after determining that “the business wasn’t there.”

Zaslav is hardly a sentimental fellow, and he does not seem to harbor very many romantic notions about CNN’s unique importance to American democracy. He wants CNN to make money, or at least to not lose a lot of it. Unfortunately, cord cutting has made cable news a less profitable business than ever, while political polarization has shrunk the audience for the down-the-middle reporting and commentary in which CNN has traditionally specialized. The cranks and coots who still watch cable news seem mostly to want programming that reinforces their priors, which is why Fox News consistently eats CNN’s lunch, while CNN gets flak from the right for being “fake,” and from the left for not being MSNBC.

Thompson has said that he sees an opportunity for CNN in this time of “peak disruption,” a statement that strikes me more as obligatory incoming CEO–speak than an actual assessment of CNN’s future prospects. Still, if you squint, you can sort of see the path for the network. Though Zaslav killed CNN+, he’s giving the network an expansive portal on Max, formerly HBO Max. If the Max portal gives CNN a fair shot at reaching new audiences beyond its core demographic, the 2024 presidential election will give CNN lots of material to turn into content that those audiences might want to watch. With competent leadership and a lot of luck, it’s not impossible that CNN might come into 2025 better off than it’s been in years.

Good leadership creates good luck, though, and it’s now on Thompson to make the sorts of moves that situate CNN to seize its current moment. Here are a few suggestions for how he might get started.

Stop living in the past: The 1990s aren’t coming back, and CNN will never again be America’s default choice for television news. America won’t ever again have a single default choice for news; the fractured media landscape isn’t going to magically reconsolidate like some reverse diaspora. Going forward, news consumers will only ever have more options tomorrow than they had today, and CNN’s goal must be to convince these people that it is a more reliable news option than some dumbass with a podcast and a lot of unusual theories about what’s actually on the moon. The network cannot accomplish this goal exclusively by relying on a reputation that means nothing to anyone born after the Clinton era. CNN must find ways to make people want to watch its news programming, rather than presuming that people are always just going to tune in out of habit.

Make interesting shows that people want to watch: The thing about the news is that it’s actually pretty interesting! You know what isn’t very interesting, though? Bland, fungible news talk that, thanks to CNN’s inherent centrism, will never be partisan enough to attract the nutters nor discursive or flamboyant enough to compete with the chattiest podcasts. I’m not saying that CNN should go all PBS or anything; I’m just suggesting that the network would add more value to the marketplace while carving out a more unique niche if it spent more time telling interesting news stories and less time talking about interesting news stories.

Stop chasing viewers who hate CNN: During his relatively brief stint as CEO, Licht booted several CNN personalities—such as John Harwood and Brian Stelter—who had been unsparing in their criticisms of Donald Trump, his administration, and their boosters on Fox News. These moves seemed to be inspired by some quixotic idea that by axing some of its top Trump critics, CNN might regain the trust of some ex-viewers who had turned away out of a belief that the network had been unfair to the former president and his supporters. But just as you cannot restore an outlet’s credibility by firing reporters who say true things about unscrupulous politicians and entities, you cannot run a news organization by pandering to people who hate and fear fact-based news. The “fake news” seditionists aren’t ever coming back, and CNN shouldn’t make any more personnel moves based on the presumption that they ever will—or that their eyeballs are ones that are still worth engaging.

Learn to walk the line between advocacy and both-sidesism: Although CNN should not deliberately pull punches in concession to bad-faith criticisms from the right, it also shouldn’t seem like the televised equivalent of one of those “In This House We Believe” yard signs. The CEO who preceded Licht, Jeff Zucker, presided over a network that, during the Trump administration, sometimes seemed as if it were actively trying to perform penance for its role in platforming then-candidate Trump in 2015 and 2016. But CNN’s core value-add is in not commentary but its clear and credible delivery of fact-based news. At the present moment, objective facts bear out the conclusion that the Republican Party is in thrall to a cult of personality led by a quadruply indicted, twice-impeached real-estate huckster who poses a unique danger to the future of American democracy—and he just so happens to be its leading candidate for president. The network cannot credibly report on the upcoming presidential election without openly acknowledging these facts, but it must do so in a way that underscores that these are facts, not just partisan opinions. The upcoming presidential campaign makes it more important than ever for CNN to clarify its principles and dial in its tone.

If all else fails, resort to stunt casting: Look, one of the best things that CNN ever did was give Anthony Bourdain a show; sure, it wasn’t “news,” but it was engaging and fun and, like the best news programming, it served to expand its viewers’ understanding of the world. We live in a time when pretty much anyone can self-identify as a journalist, and so maybe CNN might consider being similarly expansive in its casting decisions. I’m surprisingly eager to watch the network’s upcoming new prime-time show starring Charles Barkley and Gayle King; it might not be Frontline, but it might be enjoyably spicy. And if the network is looking for someone who can really get viewers hyped about breaking news, I have two words of advice: Hire Chad.