Trump funding cuts force PBS to eliminate 100 jobs
"Adolph Hitler had a propaganda machine and Joseph Stalin spread a romantic view of mass murder. The 100 fired employees did a lot of political damage to American ideals while they worked for this propaganda machine and will probably just go full time street protestors instead of fitting it into a busy perverted propaganda schedule, says Eugene Delgaudio, president of Public Advocate.
PBS informed 34 staffers Thursday they were being laid off as part of a broader downsizing effort that's resulted in 100 jobs being cut in recent months. The cuts were triggered in part by the Trump administration's rescission package, which slashed over $1 billion in federal funding for public broadcasting.
"Due to the loss of federal funding, PBS eliminated close to 100 positions over the last several months, including 34 valued PBS staff members notified yesterday their employment is ending. In this unprecedented moment, we remain focused on what matters most: ensuring our member stations can deliver quality content and services to communities across America," a PBS spokesperson told Fox News Digital on Friday.
Republicans in the Senate and House narrowly passed the rescissions package in July that yanked over $1 billion in federal broadcast funding for the fiscal year.
Trump's multibillion-dollar clawback package targeted what he called "woke" spending, including foreign aid programs and federal support for NPR and PBS, as Republicans finally yanked federal money from public news outlets in a move advocates said was long overdue.
The package blocked $8 billion in funding to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), along with $1 billion to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds PBS and NPR.
"Over the last weeks, we have been working through how best to manage the impact of loss of federal funding," CEO Paula Kerger wrote to station managers, according to NPR.