Ex-TV soap star asks to be spared conviction for Nazi salute
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An ex-television soap star is asking to be spared a criminal conviction for allegedly performing a Nazi salute.
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NBC News
4 hours ago
- NBC News
Voice of America parent terminates over 600 more staff in likely death knell
The parent agency of Voice of America said on Friday it had issued termination notices to over 639 more staff, completing an 85% decrease in personnel since March and effectively spelling the end of a broadcasting network founded to counter Nazi propaganda. Kari Lake, senior adviser to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, said the staff reduction meant 1,400 positions had been eliminated as part of U.S. President Donald Trump's agenda to cut staffing at the agency to a statutory minimum. 'Reduction in Force Termination Notices were sent to 639 employees at USAGM and Voice of America, part of a long-overdue effort to dismantle a bloated, unaccountable bureaucracy,' Lake said in a statement. She said the agency had been 'riddled with dysfunction, bias, and waste.' Lake said the move meant USAGM now operated near its statutory minimum of 81 employees. She said 250 employees would remain across USAGM, Voice of America, and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which transmits news into communist-run Cuba. She said none of OCB's 33 employees had been terminated. The move likely marks an end to VOA, which was founded in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda, operated in nearly 50 languages and reached 360 million people a week, many living under authoritarian regimes. In May, nearly 600 VOA contractors were dismissed. Some Republicans have accused VOA and other publicly funded media outlets of being biased against conservatives, and called for them to be shuttered as part of wider efforts to shrink the government. Another USAGM station, Radio Free Asia, which has already been reduced to skeleton staffing, said in a staff email on Friday that it was implementing additional furloughs in its human resources, ordinance, journalist security, and research, training & evaluation teams.
Boston Globe
10 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Hundreds of federal workers at Voice of America receive layoff notices
In March, President Donald Trump accused the news group of spreading 'anti-American' and partisan 'propaganda,' calling it 'the voice of radical America.' He then signed an executive order that effectively called for dismantling the news agency and put nearly all Voice of America reporters on paid leave, ceasing its news operations for the first time since its founding in 1942. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Kari Lake, a fierce Trump ally and a senior adviser at the news organization's oversight agency, U.S. Agency for Global Media, notified Congress earlier this month that her agency intended to eliminate most positions at Voice of America. Her letter identified fewer than 20 employees who must remain at the media organization, according to laws passed by Congress to establish and fund it. Friday's termination notices leave around 200 employees. Advertisement Lake's decision 'spells the death of 83 years of independent journalism that upholds U.S. ideals of democracy and freedom around the world,' Patsy Widakuswara, a former Voice of America White House bureau chief who was placed on leave and is leading a lawsuit against Lake and the U.S. Agency for Global Media, said in a statement. Advertisement She encouraged Congress to intervene and to signal support for Voice of America, which was founded to combat Nazi propaganda and reported in countries that suppress independent reporting and free speech. 'Moscow, Beijing, Tehran and extremist groups are flooding the global information space with anti-America propaganda,' Widakuswara said. 'Do not cede this ground by silencing America's voice.' Lake, who is leading the effort to gut Voice of America, called the news group 'a bloated, unaccountable bureaucracy' and attributed her termination of 639 employees at her agency to her goal of eliminating 'dysfunction, bias and waste.' She added, 'I'm proud to carry out President Trump's executive order and deliver results that put America first.' This article originally appeared in .
Politico
10 hours ago
- Politico
Majority of staff axed at Voice of America
The Trump administration on Friday sent out termination notices to hundreds of employees at Voice of America. Included in that group are employees working for the network's Persian-language service who were called back from administrative leave just last week in the wake of Israel's attack on Iran, according to two people familiar with the decision. The move — which makes official what has long been expected since hundreds of contract employees got termination notices in early May — is a part of the Trump administration's sweeping target to downsize the government and remake America's role in the global order. Critics of the administration's focus on VOA have said that the network has played a vital role in combatting disinformation abroad. But the administration says these cuts are in service of 'cutting waste' and putting 'American taxpayers first.' 'Today, we took decisive action to effectuate President Trump's agenda to shrink the out-of-control federal bureaucracy,' senior presidential adviser Kari Lake said in a statement released Friday . The move eliminates 1,400 jobs at U.S. Agency for Global Media, VOA's parent agency, roughly an 85 percent cut to the workforce. The last day on payroll for the employees will be Labor Day. Some of those affected by Friday's cuts who are not old enough for mandatory retirement, are being terminated without severance pay, according to one of the people. The move would contradict USAGM's policy on severance. 'As our legal team fight[s] for our rights under the law, we call on Congress to continue its long tradition of bipartisan support for VOA,' the named plaintiffs in VOA's lawsuit against the Trump administration said in a statement. 'Moscow, Beijing, Tehran and extremist groups are flooding the global information space with anti-American propaganda. Do not cede this ground by silencing America's voice.' Lake said in her statement that 250 employees will remain across the USAGM, VOA and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting. She noted that none of the OCB's 33 employees were terminated. The government-funded network, which was founded 80 years ago to combat Nazi disinformation during World War II, has — largely unsuccessfully — fought the administration's decision in court. The administration sent RIF notices to employees in small batches for weeks. But Friday's notice could deliver the coup de grâce for Voice of America after decades of providing the world with accurate information in countries where media is state-run.
