Corporation for Public Broadcasting fading to black after federal funding dries up

43

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a taxpayer-funded entity that has funneled billions of federal dollars into public radio and television stations over nearly six decades, announced Friday that it will begin shutting down operations after Congress cut off its funding.

The move comes after lawmakers passed a rescissions package and a Senate appropriations bill last month that finally zeroed out CPB’s funding — a long-debated step toward curbing federal spending on media organizations that critics have said no longer need taxpayer support.

For fiscal year 2024, the CPB received a federal appropriation of $525 million, plus an estimated $10 million in interest, totaling $535 million.

CPB stated that it has notified more than half of its staff that their positions will end with the close of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30. A small transition team will remain in place until January 2026 to oversee the formal wind-down of the organization.

Created in 1967 under President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society agenda, CPB has long served as a conduit for federal dollars to public media, particularly to PBS and NPR affiliates. While defenders claim CPB supports educational and rural programming, critics have argued for years that it props up increasingly politicized content and organizations that now compete in a diverse, saturated, and well-funded media marketplace.

With private fundraising, corporate underwriting, and substantial donor networks, outlets like NPR and PBS have expanded their reach and influence, while continuing to receive guaranteed federal support. For many fiscal conservatives, the CPB had become a symbol of outdated federal largesse: a subsidy to media outlets with ideological leanings, at the expense of taxpayers.

The defunding was opposed by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has been a staunch defender of public broadcasting. Alaska has more public radio stations than all of Florida.

The news came at the same time it became clear that President Donald Trump would prevail in court in his efforts to remove three members of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s governing commission, including Alaska’s Diane Kaplan, former president and CEO of the Rasmuson Foundation.

43 COMMENTS

  1. The corporation for public broadcasting was brought to you by the letters m a g and a and the numbers 45 and 47.

    Good riddance.

  2. I’ll be surprised if they really, truly, stop broadcasting. An individual or organization will pony up $$ to keep them afloat.

  3. Government propaganda loudspeaker. 1984. Bury this beast, forever. Make the radical left-wing loonies pay for their own damn Marxist loudspeaker.

  4. I would expect that the impact of the CPB phase-out will be less than announced. Some sugar-daddy like Soros or Billy Gates could step in to keep it all moving along in the direction they favor. For fat cats like these, the annual expenditure would be rather small for the benefits received. Another answer is that well heeled stations in Alaska, like KTOO in Juneau, will subsidize some rural stations. They also have an interest in keeping the propaganda network alive. And the Native organizations can get involved.

    In Alaska the NPR machine will keep going, albeit with some changes. Freed from the facade of impartiality, the stations will fully embrace the Left.

  5. Watched PBS all the time in the late 80’s. They went hard Left during Clintons Lewinsky scandal, and never looked back. Yet they have maintained line item budget gov cheese recipients for all these years.

  6. Time to bolt down the lid on Oscar’s trashcan and clean up slobovian Cookie Monster’s mess – and turn out the lights on commie propaganda at public expense. This comment is dedicated to the number three, whose spelling and meaning no longer exist, and never had firm foundation on any of the shows. Good-bye and good riddance, long past due. Well done Mr. Trump and cooperating Congress!

    • Cooperating Congress? More like rolling over and doing whatever Daddy tells them to do Congress. Your joy is disgraceful but typical of most people claiming to be Christian.

  7. Birthday Program was the best thing to come out of public broadcasting.
    I remember back before mobile data being on jobsites across the bush and looking forward to it at the end of the day.

    • Well, it wasn’t necessarily the “best thing” but my husband listened to it when traveling around Alaska. He said it was hysterically funny, especially when a very drunk native with poor English would get on there and pontificate. He told me many stories about it.

  8. Murkowski advocating for another $50 Billion to the Ukraine corruption pit ;

    This amounts to 10 years of funding for CPB

    Just one example of the federal swamp money drain that devalues everything you and your heirs future generations work for

  9. I hope we keep NPR if it’s not already gone, like to listen to ”here and now”, you know, just to listen to what the other side has to say.
    Old English conservative quote ”Think with the liberals, dine with the Tory’s”.

  10. No one is surprised that CPB is dead, right? I quit listening to their Trump bashing years ago. Happy to see the follow through, removing this biased entity.

  11. So where are all the private firms and everyday folks who have been sending in the $$$monthly amounts: why can’t they trim down operations and work within those income sources and prevail? They can still present their programming, as biased as it is. Just no more federal largesse.

    Too much whining for me. What a load of crap in my view.

  12. Great news. Not tired at all with this kind of winning.

    This is what happens when you disregard and disrespect half the country. Other cultural/media/entertainment types having their FAFO moment to boot. It’s delicious.

  13. With social media and private radio stations available from satellite they’re is absolutely no point in public radio anymore. It was crucial in the past its day has come and gone.

  14. Anybody remember when CPB ruined perfectly fine, self-supporting college stations by bribing the schools into programming a percentage of NPR content?

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.