Last Thursday the White House issued an overnight executive order titled “ENDING TAXPAYER SUBSIDIZATION OF BIASED MEDIA”. This order follows rumors of a memo to Congress asking to end nearly all federal funding for public media. The memo was expected in April but it never arrived.
The executive order demands that National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting Service be cut off from federal monies distributed by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Public media services wide swathes of the country that would otherwise be known as “news deserts’ and over 1000 local radio stations across the US rely on NPR funding.
The basis for the White House’s argument is that public media has become radically left-leaning, and that taxpayer money should not be funding partisan news. NPR CEO Katherine Maher and PBS CEO Paula Kerger testified before a House DOGE subcommittee in April, during which Republican lawmakers emphasized their loss of trust in public media, and questioned why the American people should subsidize (what they see as) biased reporting.
In a press release given on May 2nd, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting stated quote, “CPB is not a federal executive agency subject to the President’s authority. Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government.” NPR stated its intention to challenge the order with every available means.
This is an ongoing story and KDNK will continue to report as more information becomes available.
