longer.blue

Senator Durbin's response about PBS/NPR. Dear David:           Thank you for contacting me about President Donald Trump’s attack on public media.  I appreciate hearing from you, and I share your concern.             In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson enacted the Public Broadcasting Act (P.L. 90-129), which created the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB).  CPB is a private, nonprofit corporation that manages grants to National Public Radio (NPR) and Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) stations across the nation.  CPB is not a federal agency, and while it provides funding, it does not manage or oversee NPR and PBS.  Federal funding from CPB helps sustain public broadcasting stations, allowing them to provide local communities with unbiased and nonpartisan news coverage.  PBS receives about 15 percent of its budget from federal funding, while just one percent of NPR’s budget comes from federal funding. On May 1, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order directing CPB to terminate federal funding for NPR and PBS, falsely claiming that public media is “biased and partisan.”  He is wrong. President Trump’s executive order would especially harm rural communities, small towns, and local stations with limited resources.  For more than 50 years, Congress has reaffirmed the value of public media by providing funding to CPB on a bipartisan basis.  In a separate, but related effort, the Trump Administration plans to send a funding rescission request to Congress that reportedly would aim to cancel $9.3 billion in funding already approved by Congress for various programs, including about $1 billion in funding for CPB.  Under the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (P.L. 93-344), once the President submits a formal rescission request to Congress, Congress has 45 days to act on the proposal.  As a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, I will be sure to keep your support for public broadcasting in mind should this measure come before the Senate for consideration. The Trump Administration has made a conscious decision to flood the zone with executive actions to overwhelm our system of checks and balances and test the boundaries of executive power.  President Trump is doing this to clear the way for a multitrillion-dollar tax scam that showers the wealthy and well-connected with tax breaks at the expense of working families. I will continue to monitor President Trump’s efforts to undermine public media.  Congress must act to stop these cuts to public broadcasting.  Our democracy depends on it. Thank you again for contacting me.  Please feel free to keep in touch.         Sincerely,       Richard J. Durbin