WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday backed a push from some Republicans to strip National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting Service – NPR and PBS – of funds it receives from the federal government, one day before the heads of the two outlets are expected to face a grilling on Capitol Hill.
“I would love to do that,” Trump told reporters in the White House Cabinet Room when asked if he would support defunding NPR and PBS. “I think it’s very unfair.”
The president went on to note that the nation is “well covered,” pointing to the amount of media in the room covering his event in which he made the comments, and argued taxpayer dollars going to support the outlets is a “waste of money.”
He also asserted that the called the more than five-decades-old outlets, which both receive some funding from the government – are “biased.”
“I’d be honored to see it end,” Trump added.
The comments from the commander in chief come as Katherine Maher and Paula Kerger, the CEOs of NPR and PBS respectively, are set to descend on the Capitol on Wednesday, where they will testify at congressional hearing put on by the subcommittee designed to be the House complement to Trump and Elon Musk’s government downsizing campaign, known as the U.S. DOGE Service.
The subcommittee’s chair, firebrand conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., framed the hearing as intended to “assess whether the American taxpayer should continue to subsidize NPR and PBS.”
“I want to hear why NPR and PBS think they should ever again receive a single cent from the American taxpayer,” she said in a press release announcing the hearing, in which she also cited frustrations with the outlets’ coverage of Hunter Biden, COVID-19 and more.
Calls from some in the GOP for the federal government to defund NPR and PBS have existed for years but the issue has a new sense of urgency amid Trump and Musk’s wide-scale downsizing and cost-cutting campaign that has seen thousands fired and agencies nearly gutted.
Days after Trump took office again, the New York Times reported that the Federal Communications Commission was launching an investigation into the two outlets over concerns they are airing prohibited commercials.
Last month, meanwhile, PBS announced it was closing down its office focused on diversity, equity and inclusion as Trump looks to clamp down on such initiatives.
Both NPR and PBS receive some funding from the federal government. More than $260 million of the $545 million in the annual budget for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting – the non-profit authorized by Congress in the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 that seeks to ensure access to telecommunications services – is going to support local public television stations through direct grants this year while more than $80 million are is going to local public radio stations through direct grants.
PBS says its national program the News Hour gets about 35% of its annual funding from a combination of money from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and dues paid by local stations. The rest, the outlet says, comes from individual donations, foundation grants and corporate sponsorships.
According to NPR, 36% of its revenue over the last four years came from corporate sponsorships while 30% came from dues from local member organizations.
