National Public Radio and the Public Broadcast System receive public funds and Donald Trump wants that to end. In a late-night executive order—56 years to the day after Fred Rogers famously convinced Congress to fund PBS— Trump directed the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to cease funding the organizations. The CPB responded, saying he does not have the legal authority to do so.
"CPB is not a federal executive agency subject to the President's authority," the corporation said Friday morning. "Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government."
Trump ranted:
"REPUBLICANS MUST DEFUND AND TOTALLY DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM NPR & PBS, THE RADICAL LEFT 'MONSTERS' THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY!"
Watching conservatives set out to destroy public broadcasting is a tragedy. But I see today that NPR and PBS are spending significant resources on fawning profiles of far-right activists such as Steve Bannon and Chris Rufo. To love your executioners is to admit you're already dead—it was the last line in the book, after all. But they're still going to kill you.
