Ted Turner, CNN founder and the most audacious risk-taker in the history of American television, died peacefully on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, surrounded by his family at his home near Tallahassee, Florida. He was 87. Turner Enterprises confirmed his passing in a statement, describing him as a philanthropist, environmentalist, and cable pioneer. CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer announced his death on air, reading from the family’s statement.
Turner had announced just before his 80th birthday in 2018 that he had been diagnosed with Lewy body dementia, a degenerative disease that causes progressive decline in cognition, movement, and mood. In early 2025, he was hospitalised with a mild case of pneumonia before recovering at a rehabilitation facility. He spent his final months in hospice care, largely away from the public eye.
Robert Edward Turner III was born on November 19, 1938, in Cincinnati, Ohio. When he was nine, the family relocated to Savannah, Georgia, where his father built a successful billboard advertising business. Turner briefly attended Brown University but was expelled in 1959. He returned to the family firm, and when his father died by suicide in 1963, Ted Turner, just 24 years old, took over the company and ran it.
He was never go He bought radio stations, then moved into television in 1970 by acquiring a struggling Atlanta station called Channel 17. It eventually became WTBS, one of cable television’s first superstations. The groundwork for something far bigger was quietly being laid.
He launched the Cable News Network, the nation’s first continuous all-news television station on June 1, 1980, at a converted Jewish country club in Atlanta. That first broadcast reached 1.7 million cable television subscribers across America. At its high point, Turner Broadcasting’s networks reached two billion people in 200 countries.
Everyone told him it wouldn’t work. He did it anyway. When asked why, he once told Oprah Winfrey: “If Alexander the Great could conquer the known world, why couldn’t I start CNN?”
The network’s editorial philosophy was refreshingly stripped back. Tom Johnson, former president of CNN, once asked Turner what his rules about news were. Turner replied: “Tom, one rule: Be fair.” When Johnson pressed for more, Turner said: “That’s it.”
CNN broadcast pivotal moments in history, including live coverage of the Gulf War in 1991, the student uprising at Tiananmen Square, and the fall of the Berlin Wall. The Gulf War coverage drew approximately one billion viewers worldwide. He was named Time Magazine’s Man of the Year in 1991. Beyond CNN, he built a full media empire that includes TNT, Turner Classic Movies, the Cartoon Network, and the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks sports franchises.
In 1996, Turner sold CNN and the rest of Turner Broadcasting System to Time Warner for about $7.34 billion, a move he deeply regretted. A few years later, Time Warner merged with AOL against Turner’s wishes, in what is widely considered one of the worst corporate mergers in US business history.
In his later years, Turner gave as fearlessly as he had once gambled. In 1997, he pledged one billion dollars to the United Nations, creating the UN Foundation, which has helped the international institution endure ever since. He later gave an additional $31 million to pay off a US government debt to the UN. He also co-founded the Nuclear Threat Initiative to secure loose nuclear weapons. This initiative was one of the earliest signatories to the Giving Pledge alongside Warren Buffett and Bill Gates.
As a conservationist, Turner became one of the foremost private landowners in the United States. He owns roughly two million acres across 28 properties. Apart from that he played a crucial role in reintroducing bison to the American West. He created the Captain Planet animated series in 1990 specifically to teach children about the environment, putting his values on screen long before it was fashionable to do so.
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Turner was married three times. His third marriage was to actress Jane Fonda, from 1991 to 2001. Fonda called him her favourite ex-husband and remembered him warmly after his death. Tributes also poured in from Donald Trump, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, and wrestling icon Ric Flair, among many others.
He is survived by his five children, 14 grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.
Ted Turner did not just build a network. He built an idea that the news never stops, and neither should the people covering it. That idea now runs in the bloodstream of nearly every television news operation on earth. Not bad for a man who was once thrown out of university for having a girl in his room.
