An Elusive Touchdown with a Political Football
Trump’s Defunding of Public Broadcasting and Radio
On July 19 the U.S. Congress decided to “claw back” money it had appropriated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) for the first time since its funding began 60 years ago. To those who live in countries with a long tradition of government-funded public service media, this must seem incomprehensible. Why would the legislature withdraw taxpayers’ dollars it had already appropriated to ensure that National Public Radio (NPR), the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), and their member outlets would survive and thrive, providing news and entertainment programming throughout the country? Doesn’t this violate the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, declaring that “Congress shall make no law…abridging…the freedom of the press”?
The peculiar history of U.S. public broadcasting
To answer these questions, we must first consider the peculiar history of public broadcasting in the United States. The founders of the country were deeply suspicious of government-controlled or licensed newspapers and other printed media – hence, the unequivocal language of the First Amendment. But with the advent of new media technologies, including broadcast and satellite, Congress struggled to reconcile the perceived need to regulate them with the words of the Constitution. The Communications Act of 1934 established the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the government agency which implements laws governing the licensing and operation of electronic communications technologies. The FCC was seen as a necessary evil to administer the limited broadcast spectrum fairly and in the public interest. Its authority to control content, however, is strictly limited. Notably, viewpoint-based censorship is not permitted.
With a largely laissez-faire environment, commercial broadcasting and cable operations flourished, though their content sometimes devolved into what then-FCC Chair Newton Minow called, in 1961, a “vast wasteland.” Meanwhile, public service broadcasting was limited for the most part to stations based at colleges and universities. Many of these “educational” radio and television stations had limited reach and struggled financially to produce and distribute programming to the classroom and beyond.
“It will belong to all our people”
In response, in 1967, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act, whose purpose, he said, was to give these stations a wider voice and “to enrich man’s spirit” by creating “a great network for knowledge” and “the enlightenment of all the people.”
To fulfill these goals, the statute created the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), tasked with providing support for these stations, in part through distributing Congressional appropriations. But despite that government funding, Johnson asserted, “It will be free, and it will be independent – and it will belong to all of our people.”
Public broadcasting as political football
Initially, CPB enjoyed bipartisan support, and provided subsidies to hundreds of public media outlets throughout the United States. Inevitably, though, CPB’s very independence in the face of government funding made it a political football, as critics from both the political left and right complained that public broadcasting failed to fulfill its mandates to deliver independent, diverse, objective, and balanced programming. Johnson’s successor, President Richard Nixon, who was infuriated when PBS launched a national evening news show hosted by Robert MacNeil and Sander Vanocur – who he considered to be a “well-known Kennedy sympathizer” whose reporting had contributed to Nixon’s loss in the 1960 election – attempted to control CPB by packing it with Republican board members to curtail news and public affairs programming he considered biased. As MacNeil put it, “Bias in their minds is apparently any attitude which does not indicate permanent genuflection before the wisdom and purity of Richard Milhous Nixon.”
Despite his best efforts, Nixon did not succeed in gutting Congressional appropriations to CPB, and ironically, PBS’ gavel-to-gavel coverage of the Watergate hearings which eventually led to Nixon’s resignation, helped to strengthen nationwide support for public media.
Twenty years later, in 1995, Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich also tried, unsuccessfully, to “zero out” federal support for public media as part of the infamous “Contract with America,” claiming liberal bias and propagandizing children. As then-Sen. Dick Durbin recalled in 2011, “cooler heads prevailed” in both parties, and “Big Bird was spared.”
Trump seeks to defund public media
But although public media continued to provide unique and invaluable services, including local news and emergency programing in isolated parts of the country, the climate was inexorably shifting and expanding. One of the primary rationales for continued government support of public stations – limited commercial outlets for rural populations – seemed to be eroding as numerous options for accessing news and informational programming emerged. Coupled with claims of content bias, it became easier for the opponents of CPB to argue against government support.
No one made that argument more forcefully than President Donald Trump, whose contempt for public broadcasting reached its apotheosis following his reelection in 2024. On April 1, 2025, he wrote on Truth Social, “REPUBLICANS MUST DEFUND AND TOTALLY DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM NPR & PBS, THE RADICAL LEFT “MONSTERS” THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY!” On April 28, Trump announced he was removing three CPB board members, prompting the corporation to sue him, arguing that the president did not have the power to do so because CPB is not a “federal agency” and its board members are not government officers serving at his pleasure. The federal judge presiding declined to issue a preliminary injunction; in July, the president in turn sued CPB, demanding that the court enforce his order. Meanwhile, Trump issued an executive order on May 1, purporting to terminate any federal funding to NPR and PBS.
Trump sends his rescission proposal to Congress
But this skirmish with the CPB board was a distraction from the big game. Trump’s authority to defund public broadcasting unilaterally is questionable. As David Super has outlined on this blog, Congress holds the power of the purse, not the president. The president’s only clear path forward would be to request a rescission package under the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (ICA), a federal law enacted to stop Richard Nixon from withholding appropriated funds. Under the law, Congress has 45 days to approve the request. If Congress declines to rescind appropriated funds, the funds must be disbursed.
Bear in mind that Congress had already appropriated the funds in question, with bipartisan support. But Trump exerted pressure on Republicans, warning that he would withhold his endorsement from members of Congress who defied him.
In the end, most capitulated, and bill, having passed both houses, awaits Trump’s signature.
The future of public broadcasting
Representatives of public broadcasting had catastrophized the financial impact of the funding cuts to both legislators and the public while the rescission proposal was pending. Once it passed, they vowed to carry on as best they could. As Katherine Maher, CEO of NPR, said in a press release, “Tonight, our network’s service to the nation suffered a tremendous setback. Together — and with support from listeners and readers in communities around the nation — we will work to rebuild.”
Those are brave and optimistic words of defiance, directed at Congress as much as at Trump. History suggests that only the current president could have persuaded Congress to defund public broadcasting. His hardcore supporters are no doubt delighted with this outcome. But according to Maher, two-thirds of the American public support federal funding for public media. Whether their support will extend to their individual pocketbooks – or register at the ballot box at the midterm elections in 2026, when many of those who voted for rescission will have to face their constituents – remains to be seen.