Trump moves to officially strip $1 BILLION from 'radical left monsters' NPR and PBS
President Donald Trump 's demand to strip $1.1 billion in federal funding from National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service came one step closer to reality.
Tuesday night House Speaker Mike Johnson said that he had officially received the rescissions request from the White House to extinguish a total of $9.4 billion in funding from NPR, PBS, the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development, the latter of which the administration has disassembled.
The $1.1 billion was Congressional funding for the public broadcasters for the next two years. Only about 1 percent of NPR's budget comes from the federal government, but the heads of NPR and PBS have both warned that local TV and radio stations could be impacted by this move.
Johnson said he would put the rescission bill on the floor next week.
'Now that this wasteful spending by the federal government has been identified by DOGE, quantified by the Administration, and sent to Congress, House Republicans will fulfill our mandate and continue codifying into law a more efficient federal government,' Johnson said. 'This is exactly what the American people deserve.'
For months Trump has demanded that NPR and PBS lose their federal funding.
'REPUBLICANS MUST DEFUND AND TOTALLY DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM NPR & PBS, THE RADICAL LEFT "MONSTERS" THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY!' the president wrote in an April Fool's Day Truth Social post.
But he wasn't joking.
For months Trump has demanded that NPR and PBS lose their federal funding. He sent out this Truth Social post on April Fool's Day but the president wasn't joking
On May 1, Trump signed an executive order to strip the two taxpayer subsidized entities of their federal dollars.
The White House claimed that NPR and PBS 'spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as "news."'
A press release listed a number of stories the administration found objectionable.
Among them - a 2015 report on the annual 'furry' festival in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; a 2017 report on a book about cannibalism, and a 2024 Valentine's Day report on ' queer animals.'
PBS should be defunded, the White House argued, because it produced a documentary that argued the case for reparations - payments made to descendents of enslaved Americans.
The White House also expressed dissatisfaction that PBS had aired a documentary of a transgender teenage boy and that Sesame Street had partnered with CNN and held a town hall amid the 'Black Lives Matter' protests in June 2020 to address racism.
The administration complained that the program showcased a 'one-sided narrative.'
The White House also blasted NPR and PBS for liberal bias and for having 'zero tolerance for non-leftist viewpoints.'
In late May, NPR and three Colorado NPR stations sued the administration over Trump's executive order claiming that it 'violates the expressed will of Congress.'
That could change, however, if the rescission request goes through.
It only needs a simple majority in the House and Senate to pass - and Republicans have a narrow majority in both chambers.
There has been some GOP resistance on this vote because the broader package also includes funding for PEPFAR, the successful HIV/AIDs prevention started under the White House of Republican President George W. Bush.
'I will not support a cut in PEPFAR, which is a program that has saved literally millions of lives and has been extremely effective and well run,' Republican Sen. Susan Collins told reporters, according to NPR.
Collins then sidestepped a question about cutting NPR and PBS' funding.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
18 minutes ago
- The Independent
Israeli-backed group seeks at least $30 million from US for aid distribution in Gaza
A U.S.-led group has asked the Trump administration to step in with an initial $30 million so it can continue its much scrutinized and Israeli-backed aid distribution in Gaza, according to three U.S. officials and the organization's application for the money. That application, obtained by The Associated Press, also offers some of the first financial details about the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and its work in the territory. The foundation says it has provided millions of meals in southern Gaza since late May to Palestinians as Israel's blockade and military campaign have driven the Gaza to the brink of famine. But the effort has seen near-daily fatal shootings of Palestinians trying to reach the distribution sites. Major humanitarian groups also accuse the foundation of cooperating with Israel's objectives in the 20-month-old war against Hamas in a way that violates humanitarian principles. The group's funding application was submitted to the U.S. Agency for International Development, according to the U.S. officials, who were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. The application was being processed this week as potentially one of the agency's last acts before the Republican administration absorbs USAID into the State Department as part of deep cuts in foreign assistance. Two of the officials said they were told the administration has decided to award the money. They said the processing was moving forward with little of the review and auditing normally required before Washington makes foreign assistance grants to an organization. In a letter submitted Thursday as part of the application, Gaza Humanitarian Foundation secretary Loik Henderson said his organization 'was grateful for the opportunity to partner with you to sustain and scale life-saving operations in Gaza.' Neither the State Department nor Henderson immediately responded to requests for comment Saturday. Israel says the foundation is the linchpin of a new aid system to wrest control from the United Nations, which Israel alleges has been infiltrated by Hamas, and other humanitarian groups. The foundation's use of fixed sites in southern Gaza is in line with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plan to use aid to concentrate the territory's more than 2 million people in the south, freeing Israel to fight Hamas elsewhere. Aid workers fear it's a step toward another of Netanyahu's public goals, removing Palestinians from Gaza in 'voluntary' migrations that aid groups and human rights organizations say would amount to coerced departures. The U.N. and many leading nonprofit groups accuse the foundation of stepping into aid distribution with little transparency or humanitarian experience, and, crucially, without a commitment to the principles of neutrality and operational independence in war zones. Since the organization started operations, several hundred Palestinians have been killed and hundreds more wounded in near-daily shootings as they tried to reach aid sites, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. Witnesses say Israeli troops regularly fire heavy barrages toward the crowds in an attempt to control them. The Israeli military has denied firing on civilians. It says it fired warning shots in several instance, and fired directly at a few 'suspects' who ignored warnings and approached its forces. It's unclear who is funding the new operation in Gaza. No donor has come forward. The State Department said this past week that the United States is not funding it. In documents supporting its application, the group said it received nearly $119 million for May operations from 'other government donors,' but gives no details. It expects $38 million from those unspecific government donors for June, in addition to the hoped-for $30 million from the United States. The application shows no funding from private philanthropy or any other source.
The Independent
23 minutes ago
- The Independent
AOC blasts Trump's ‘illegal' persecution of Mahmoud Khalil as she welcomes Columbia student back to NYC
Standing beside a recently released Mahmoud Khalil, Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez condemned Donald Trump's administration for the 'illegal' persecution of the Columbia University student, who was imprisoned for more than three months in an immigration detention center for his pro-Palestinian activism. The New York congresswoman joined Khalil and his family at Newark Liberty International Airport Saturday for a press conference moments after his return. 'Because Mahmoud Khalil is an advocate for Palestinian human rights, he has been accused, baselessly, of horrific allegations simply because the Trump administration and our overall establishment disagrees with his political speech,' she said. Khalil was stripped of his green card and arrested in front of his then-pregnant wife in their New York City apartment building on March 8. He was then sent to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Louisiana, where he was kept for months and forced to miss the birth of his child. On Friday, a federal judge granted his release from ICE detention on bail while legal challenges against his arrest and threat of removal from the country continue in both federal and immigration courts. 'It is wrong, it is illegal, it is a violation of his First Amendment rights, it is an affront to every American and ... we will continue to resist the politicization and the continued political persecution that ICE is engaged in,' Ocasio-Cortez said. 'Everyone agrees that the persecution based on political speech is wrong and is a violation of all of our First Amendment rights, not just Mahmoud's,' she added. Khalil, who is Palestinian, grew up in a refugee camp in Syria. He entered the United States on a student visa in 2022 to pursue a master's degree in public administration and emerged as a face of Columbia demonstrations against Israel's war in Gaza. Trump administration officials have accused Khalil of 'antisemitic activities,' allegations Khalil and his legal team have flatly denied. 'The U.S. government is funding this genocide, and Columbia University is investing in this genocide,' he told reporters at Newark. 'This is what I was protesting, this is what I will continue to protest with every one of you, not only if they threaten me with detention, even if they kill me, I will still speak up for Palestine.' Speaking out for Palestinian rights is 'speech that should actually be celebrated rather than punished, as if this administration wants to do,' Khalil said. Officials concede that Khalil did not commit any crime, but Secretary of State Marco Rubio has sought to justify Khalil's arrest by invoking a rarely used law claiming that Khalil's presence in the United States undermines foreign policy interests to prevent antisemitism. A judge's order for his release is the latest in a string of high-profile legal losses for the Trump administration following the arrests of international scholars for their pro-Palestinian activism. Their arrests sparked widespread outrage against the administration's apparent attempts to crush campus dissent, while Rubio has said he 'proudly' revoked hundreds of student visas over campus activism. The Trump administration 'knows they are waging a losing legal battle' against pro-Palestine students, and are 'violating the law' to build a campaign against them, Ocasio-Cortez said. Lawyers for the Trump administration appealed the order for his release on Friday night. A spokesperson for Homeland Security called the order 'yet another example of how out-of-control members of the judicial branch are undermining national security.'
Reuters
25 minutes ago
- Reuters
LA Dodgers pledge $1 million for families impacted by ICE raids
The Los Angeles Dodgers have committed $1 million toward direct financial assistance for families of immigrants impacted by the surge in detentions and deportations in the region, the team announced on Friday. Lisa Bernhard produced this report.
