Topline
President Donald Trump signed an executive order seeking to cut federal funding for NPR and PBS on Thursday, while accusing both public broadcasters of being “biased” and “woke”—a grievance the president has brought up several times in the past.
Trump has ordered to cut federal funding to NPR and PBS, accusing them of being biased in their news … More
Key Facts
The executive order directs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) to “cease direct funding to NPR and PBS,” noting that this action aligns with the Trump administration’s policy “to ensure that Federal funding does not support biased and partisan news coverage.”
The order states that the CPB will “cancel existing direct funding to the maximum extent allowed by law” and “decline to provide future funding.”
The CPB has also been ordered to cease any “indirect funding” to NPR and PBS by ensuring that licensees of public radio and TV stations do not use federal funding for the two broadcasters.
The order claims that, unlike in 1967 when the CPB was established, the current media landscape has “abundant, diverse, and innovative news options,” which makes government funding of news media “outdated and unnecessary.”
The Trump administration’s “Rapid Response” X handle posted about the order and said it would end “taxpayer subsidization of NPR and PBS” and alleged the outlets “spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’”
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How Reliant Are Pbs And Npr On Federal Government Funding?
PBS and NPR have not commented on Trump’s executive order yet. However, PBS CEO Paula Kerger discussed the issue of federal funding in an interview earlier this week. Kerger said the annual funding to PBS “amounts to about $1.60 per person a year,” and this money is used to fund the operations of PBS stations across the country. Kerger also noted that, unlike most public broadcasters around the world, which are almost entirely state-funded, federal funding only accounts for “about 15%” of PBS’ budget. The rest of the funding “comes from contributed money from viewers.”
This is a developing story.
