The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a non-profit organization that distributes federal funds to public radio and television stations throughout the U.S., recently declared that it will be shutting down at the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.
This announcement followed a $1.1 billion budget cut signed into law by President Donald Trump, which ultimately has threatened the stability of all public broadcasting in the U.S., and is the first time that the federal government has refused to fund CPB. CPB funds several major broadcasting outlets that people rely on for news and entertainment, such as PBS and NPR, which have raised concerns over the continuation of these organizations in the future.
CPB has already been forced to lay off the majority of their employees, foreshadowing larger layoffs within the nearly 1,500 radio and television stations they fund. For fiscal year 2025, the federal government provided CPB $545 million, which was distributed between the thousands of stations. With such little funding compared to the large number of stations they serve, the $1.1 billion funding cut is disastrous — and threatens a loss of public broadcasting throughout the nation.
Trump’s massive cuts to CPB, and consequently public broadcasting stations like PBS and NPR, have resulted in a deterioration of education and public knowledge in our country. Public media is vital to the distribution of knowledge throughout American society, most notably among children. For example, PBS KIDS offers several benefits for children’s development, including the fostering of foundational educational skills, such as in reading, writing, mathematics and social-emotional learning. By targeting these organizations, whether intentionally or not, Trump has harmed the quality of public education in the U.S., disparaging key accessible educational tools for children.
Not only that, but cuts to NPR will prove detrimental to the spread of credible information throughout the country. NPR is one of the most reliable and unbiased news sources in the country, with a score of 43.09 on a scale of 0 to 64 for reliability (the higher the score, the more reliable) and -4.26 on a sale of -42 to 42 for bias (a lower score means the source is more left-leaning and a higher score means the source is more right-leaning) from the Ad Fontes Media Bias chart. With a score of this level, NPR is one of the only radio stations that can be fully trusted with news. By cutting funds for broadcasting stations like these, Trump is only damaging the credibility of journalism in our country and paving the way for more biased, privately-funded broadcasting stations to spread misinformation throughout the country.
While the cuts to public broadcasting have most notably affected educational radio and television stations on a national scale, they have also presented several dangers to public broadcasting of music. On Aug. 8, Clark Atlanta University’s radio station, WCLK, or more popularly known as Jazz 91.9, released a call-to-action for funding out of desperation. The announcement explained that due to Trump’s budget cuts, WCLK has been forced to ask their listeners for funding support, or else face the risk of shutting down. Since 1974, WCLK has been an essential radio station to promote jazz music throughout history, preserving a cultural art form and raising awareness about the significance of the genre in American society.
By cutting funding for hundreds of local radio, television and media stations across the country — and potentially causing their doors to close — Trump has indirectly threatened one of the very principles that our nation is built on: the right to free speech.
Public broadcasting organizations allow for people to express free speech in several ways, whether through the broadcasting of music to hundreds of thousands of listeners on the radio, or the broadcasting of key academic tools and educational lessons to hundreds of thousands of children. Nonetheless, by directly cutting funds for CPB, Trump has made it harder for these organizations to function, and has continued his harmful campaign against the freedom of speech and the freedom of the press in the U.S.
With Trump’s cuts to the U.S. Department of Education announced earlier in the year, and the increasingly present spread of misinformation throughout U.S. media, American education is already on an alarming decline. Slashing the already meager budget that the CPB receives only reinforces Trump’s stance on education and the press, and has raised concerns over the future of public broadcasting in the U.S.
