On September 30th, federal funds for local National Public Radio (NPR) and Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) stations officially ran out. In July, Republican lawmakers passed H.R. 4, Trump’s rescissions package, which clawed back $1.1 billion in previously allocated funds to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). Though the CPB disburses funding to public media organizations throughout the U.S., most of the federal funding that was cut was allocated for local member stations; this funding kept news departments afloat and supported local programming. Without this federal funding, the CPB has wound down its operations, and many local NPR and PBS stations are facing layoffs, cuts to programming, and even station closures.
Roughly 98% of Americans live within range of one of the 1000+ public radio stations affected by the Trump administration’s budget cuts. These stations provide important local news coverage at a time when such coverage has declined in mainstream media. Additionally, many NPR stations are the only source of emergency bulletins, and in some rural areas with limited broadband access, they are the only sources of news at all. NPR, PBS, and other public news sources are now relying entirely on public donations to provide “free access to trustworthy journalism”.
As part of their counter proposal for the FY 2026 federal budget, Democratic lawmakers pushed to reverse Trump’s budget cuts to CPB and public broadcasting, and they included safeguards against the administration’s continued use of the budget rescissions process and illegal impoundment to usurp Congress’s control of the federal budget. I demand that you restore CPB funding and regain control of Congressional authority as an equal branch of the government.
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