The situation for NPR and PBS looks to have gone from bad to worse during the second Trump administration. On Monday, the White House put together a rescissions plan. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought also put together a memo. In addition to asking Congress to eliminate funding for these biased outlets, the White House is also asking that cuts from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) be codified.
On Monday, the White House briefing room shared a whole list of examples on how "The NPR, PBS Grift Has Ripped Us Off for Too Long."
"For years, American taxpayers have been on the hook for subsidizing National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), which spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as 'news,'" that piece began by mentioning before going on to list examples. "As President Trump has stated, taxpayer funding of NPR’s and PBS’s biased content is a waste."
Such a move from the Trump White House comes after the bias of NPR and PBS was further exposed during a recent House Committee hearing before the DOGE subcommittee, which falls under the House Oversight Committee. The hearing went particularly poorly for NPR's CEO Katherine Maher, as Townhall covered at the time of the hearing late last month.
Trump also posted to social media on March 27 and April 1 his desire to see PBS and NPR defunded.
NPR and PBS, two horrible and completely biased platforms (Networks!), should be DEFUNDED by Congress, IMMEDIATELY. Republicans, don’t miss this opportunity to rid our Country of this giant SCAM, both being arms of the Radical Left Democrat Party. JUST SAY NO AND, MAKE AMERICA…
— Donald J. Trump Posts From His Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) March 27, 2025
REPUBLICANS MUST DEFUND AND TOTALLY DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM NPR & PBS, THE RADICAL LEFT “MONSTERS” THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY!
— Donald J. Trump Posts From His Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) April 1, 2025
Donald Trump Truth Social 4/01/25 04:17 PM
As the New York Post detailed about the plan:
The major funding changes are contained in a long-awaited “rescissions” plan, obtained and first reported by The Post, that pitches a clawback of $1.1 billion appropriated for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and $8.3 billion from USAID.
A memo drafted by White House budget director Russ Vought — and requested by GOP congressional leaders — accuses CPB of a “lengthy history of anti-conservative bias” and cites “waste, fraud, and abuse” at USAID.
Formal transmission of the plan to lawmakers will start a 45-day clock for the Republican-held House and Senate to either adopt or reject the blueprint, which the White House believes will pass — unlike President Trump’s 2018 rescission plan, which failed by one vote in the Senate.
“Since day one, the Trump Administration has targeted waste, fraud, and abuse in Federal spending through executive action, DOGE review, and other efforts by departments and agencies. Congress has expressed strong interest in supporting those efforts, and requested the Administration transmit rescissions to the Hill for swift approval,” Vought’s memo says.
“OMB recommends the Administration respond with two proposals to cut $9.3 billion. The first includes a rescission of $8.3 billion in wasteful foreign aid spending (out of $22 billion) that does not expire in Fiscal Year (FY) 2025. The second is a separate rescission of all Federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) — which funds the politically biased public radio and public television system.”
The White House memo notes that NPR CEO Katherine Maher once called Trump a “fascist” and a “deranged racist” — statements that Maher told Congress last month she now regrets making — and cites two recent PBS programs featuring transgender characters.
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Musk’s DOGE initiative is seeking to cut $1 trillion in annual spending — a sum that would halve the annual federal deficit — and some cuts can be done without legislation.
Vought’s memo identifies numerous examples that it says are “illustrative of the waste that could continue [at USAID] without the rescission.”
The list includes $9.4 million for “Championing Transformative Changes in Gender Norms,” $3 million for Iraqi Sesame Street, $500,000 for electric buses in Rwanda, $6 million for Palestinian media and civic society support, $882,000 to fund social media mentorship in Serbia and Belarus, $1 million for voter ID in Haiti, and $3 million for circumcision, vasectomies and condoms in Zambia.
The State Department last month proposed absorbing USAID after deep DOGE-led staffing cuts.
The package also contains smaller cuts to three other agencies that Trump targeted in a February executive order that called for them to be pared to “the minimum presence and function required by law” — including $15 million from the US Institute of Peace, $27 million from the Inter-American Foundation and $22 million from the US African Development Foundation.
Senate Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is among the Republican leaders who requested that the White House draft the proposal, which can pass with a bare majority.
Republicans have been calling for NPR and PBS to stand on their own without government funding for some time now, especially as the outlets put out such one-sided content. The outlets should be just fine having to operate on their own. "NPR and PBS both have diverse revenue streams, including major foundation grants, advertising and voluntary viewer and listener donations, meaning that neither is likely to cease operations if they lose federal funding," the Post mentioned.
On Monday night, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) shared the New York Post article over X, reiterating that NPR and PBS can put out "their biased coverage," but that it need not be funded by taxpayers, as he called for defunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB).
Kennedy also spoke about NPR and PBS from the Senate floor last week, as he reminded that funding such outlets is "not the role of the federal government."
NPR and PBS have a right to publish their biased coverage—but they don’t have a right to spend taxpayer money on it.
— John Kennedy (@SenJohnKennedy) April 14, 2025
It’s time to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.https://t.co/D9bwQcqabL
Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX), who had many memorable moments during that DOGE subcommittee hearing, also weighed in on over X. Gill even tagged Maher when sharing a screenshot of the piece put out by the White House.
Time to claw back every single taxpayer penny from woke media that hate us.
— Congressman Brandon Gill (@RepBrandonGill) April 15, 2025
Not one more dime of your money should fund their propaganda. pic.twitter.com/syml4ouxAf
I bet @krmaher remembers this. pic.twitter.com/A7pxnMYrrx
— Congressman Brandon Gill (@RepBrandonGill) April 15, 2025
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