President Donald Trump issued a statement honoring Ted Turner on Wednesday, saying the media mogul was “personally devastated” that he had sold CNN and the company had “woke up,” and also expressed hope that the Ellison family could “restore it to its former credibility and glory.”
Turner, founder of CNN and Turner Networks, died on Wednesday at the age of 87.
“Ted Turner, one of the all-time greats, just died. He founded CNN, sold it, and was personally devastated by the deal because the new ownership took CNN, his ‘baby,’ and destroyed it,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “He woke up, and everything is not everything.”
Trump did not explicitly mention the Ellison family name — nor did Larry nor Paramount CEO David — in his post, but he did point to Paramount’s massive $110 billion deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery; The latter media company owns CNN. “Maybe new buyers, and wonderful people, can restore it to its former credibility and glory. Regardless, however, one of the greats in broadcasting history, and a friend of mine. Whenever I needed him, he was there, always ready to fight for a good cause! President Donald J. Trump,” he wrote.
The CNN founder was an ardent environmentalist, having established the Turner Foundation in 1990, which was created “to protect and restore the natural systems – air, land and water – on which all life depends,” as its mission statement says.
Turner not only founded CNN, he had a major impact on the broader news landscape. He launched CNN in 1980 and had a major influence on establishing the cable business through satellite broadcasting of his superstation WTBS. He also founded TNT, TCM, and Cartoon Network. He sold his media empire to Time Warner in 1995 for $6.5 billion.
Turner was honored by a number of fellow media figures on Wednesday, including David Zaslav, Rupert Murdoch, Mark Lazarus and Brian Roberts.
“Ted was a visionary, pioneer, and founding force behind many of the brands that are essential to Warner Bros. Discovery today. Ted’s entrepreneurial spirit, creative ambition, and willingness to take risks changed the media industry forever,” wrote Zaslav, president and CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery. Discovery, in a memo to WBD employees on Wednesday. “He believed strongly in the power of ideas, in doing things differently, and in building platforms that could inform, inspire and connect people around the world. This belief has inspired generations of leaders, myself included. He didn’t just disrupt media, he transformed it.”
