In Light of Congressional Testimony, Congress Should Defund NPR and PBS

Last week, NPR CEO Katherine Maher and PBS CEO Paula Krueger testified in front of Congress about allegedly biased journalism in each of these outlets. While congressmen are right to be angry over how NPR and PBS covered certain stories, a more important issue is at stake: The federal government should not be funding journalistic outlets, and Congress should end all funding for these companies.

Elon Musk labeled NPR a U.S. State medium on X

Elon Musk caused a stir when he labeled NPR as a “government-affiliated” news network akin to Russia Today (RT) or People’s Daily in China. While this is an exaggeration, it is also not accurate for NPR to claim that it only gets 1% of its funding from the government. For much of its history, NPR relied primarily on federal funding, but that changed in the 1980s as threats of defunding from Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich forced it to seek other revenue sources. Currently, NPR’s biggest source of revenue is corporate sponsorships, at $121 million. Second is federal funding of $90 million, which makes up about 30% of funding. If Congress cuts federal funding to NPR, it will still leave NPR with 70% of its budget. 

While memories of Mr. Rogers color most people’s impressions of public broadcasting, there is a darker side to public broadcasting that calls into question whether the government should be funding it. As a partially government-funded outlet, NPR claims to be an unbiased news source. However, in the 2020 Election cycle, NPR stifled coverage of the Hunter Biden laptop story, which chronicled the younger Biden’s shady business dealings and his father, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden’s possible involvement. More tellingly, former NPR editor Uri Berliner revealed in an essay that registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans in the NPR newsroom by an astonishing 87-to-0 margin.

As public entities, NPR and PBS shouldn’t have all their staff from one party

If this were a private outlet, this wouldn’t be an issue. One would expect not to find many registered Republicans at the Young Turks, nor would many Democrats expect to be found at the Daily Wire. NPR is not a private outlet; it receives public money to the tune of $535 million per year. If NPR and PBS are not unbiased news outlets, then they are failing at their founding mission. To expect balanced content from a newsroom employing 87 members of one party and zero from the other is highly questionable. 

There are other reasons why Congress should end public funding of NPR and PBS. By their own admission, NPR doesn’t even need the funding they receive from the federal government. Congress should call their bluff and give them what they want. In addition, much of the content produced by PBS is not something that requires government funding to exist. While Mr. Rogers, Sesame Street, and Liberty’s Kids all serve a noble purpose, it is doubtful that the private sector could not support this content on its own. The success of content like Peppa Pig, Bluey, and many others shows there is public demand for this type of thing.

The Constitution does not authorize public broadcasting

There is a more fundamental reason why Congress should cut funding to NPR and PBS: Nothing in the Constitution gives the federal government the authority for public broadcasting. The Constitution only gives the federal government the powers specifically defined in the Constitution and reserves all other powers to the states and to the people.

Issues like public funding of broadcasting go to the core of our constitutional order. Policies and funding not only have to pass the test of “Are they needed?” but they also have to pass the test of “Is it constitutional?” The Founders designed our Constitution to limit the government and safeguard our rights from tyranny. If we allow the government to violate the Constitution with regard to public broadcasting, we are permitting it to violate the Constitution in other ways. If we are to protect our constitutional order, we need to enforce the Constitution in all areas of life. 

The testimony of PBS and NPR CEOs in front of Congress last week reminded us of the bias deep in both of these organizations. They also exposed a greater problem: Funding for NPR and PBS is unnecessary and unconstitutional. Defunding NPR and PBS would be a welcome step in restoring our constitutional order. 

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.