Who Owns CNN in 2026 — and Is the Owner Really a Republican? The Answer Is Changing This Year

By the Between the News desk · researched with AI tools, checked and edited by a human editor

Today CNN belongs to Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company — no single person owns itParamount Skydance is buying WBD for ~$111 billion — shareholders approved in April 2026, the DOJ cleared it June 12, closing expected Q3 2026Paramount Skydance is controlled by the Ellison family; Larry Ellison is one of Silicon Valley's most prominent Trump alliesLongtime WBD board power John Malone said CNN has 'embedded' liberal bias and wanted it more centristSources: NPR, Variety, Paramount press release, SEC filings

CNN in the Media Guide: ownership, bias rating and every analysis →

👁Decoded

Short answer for 2026: CNN is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company — so today, no, CNN is not owned by a Republican, or by any single person at all. Its shares sit in index funds, pensions and institutional portfolios. But hold that thought, because the answer has an expiry date printed on it.

Paramount Skydance agreed in February 2026 to buy Warner Bros. Discovery — CNN included — for about $111 billion. WBD shareholders approved the $31-a-share deal in April. The Justice Department's antitrust division cleared it on June 12. The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of 2026. In other words: CNN is a few regulatory signatures away from having an actual family as its ultimate owner.

And that family is the Ellisons. David Ellison runs Paramount Skydance; the fortune behind it belongs to his father Larry Ellison, the Oracle co-founder and one of Silicon Valley's most prominent Trump allies. Which makes the autocomplete question — "is CNN owned by a Republican?" — suddenly a lot less paranoid than it sounds. Today: no. By autumn, quite possibly: effectively, yes.

The Republican-owner rumor didn't come from nowhere, though. For years the loudest voice around CNN's parent company was John Malone, the cable billionaire and longtime Warner Bros. Discovery board power (now retired to "Chair Emeritus"). Malone said out loud that CNN has "embedded" liberal bias and that he wanted the channel to be more centrist. He never owned CNN outright — but if you half-remembered "conservative billionaire influences CNN's parent," this is the man you were half-remembering.

There's also a corporate subplot worth knowing: WBD had announced it would split itself in two, with CNN going into a TV-networks company. The Paramount takeover battle — Netflix bid too, then dropped out — effectively shelved that plan. So the "who owns CNN" answer changed twice in twelve months, and most explainers online are already out of date.

What should you actually watch? Not the paperwork — the programming. CNN is the channel half the internet calls liberal and the incoming owner's family calls it that too. If the tone shifts after the deal closes, you'll want to have known the ownership timeline. Now you do.

“Today: no. By autumn: effectively, quite possibly yes.”