A look at the history of public media in the U.S. as Republicans target federal funding (2025)

Geoff Bennett:

President Trump today voiced his support for defunding America's public broadcasters. It comes a day before the heads of PBS and NPR testify in front of the House Subcommittee on Delivering Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

The hearing will examine alleged bias in public media, with calls for federal funding cuts growing louder. That funding in part helps support the work of PBS News.

We wanted to take a moment to explain exactly how public media is funded and more broadly how we got to this point.

William Brangham is back with that.

William Brangham:

In the weeks since President Trump took office, his allies have repeatedly taken aim at the nation's public broadcasters, accusing them of liberal bias.

Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX):

Pushing leftism.

Rep. James Comer (R-KY):

Liberal indoctrination.

Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY):

Propaganda from the left.

William Brangham:

Elon Musk has also called for defunding PBS and NPR.

Now, allegations of bias and threats to public media are about as old as the industry itself, so it's important to understand the history.

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Remington electric shaver.

William Brangham:

For a lot of the 1900s, broadcasting in the U.S. was dominated by commercial networks. They sold on-air ads and used that revenue to pay for programming, but some wanted an alternative.

So, in the 1960s, the Carnegie Corporation launched a study of non-commercial TV in the and how to bring it to more Americans.

Victor Pickard, University of Pennsylvania: A system that, in their view, could focus more on educational programming, making sure that all members of society have access to broadcast media, going places where there simply were not incentives for a commercial media system.

William Brangham:

A key recommendation of the Carnegie report was for the federal government to provide funds to help operate stations across the country.

In 1967, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act, which did just that.

Lyndon Baines Johnson, President of the United States: Today, we rededicate a part of the airways which belonged to all the people.

William Brangham:

The law led to the creation of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, or CPB. It's a nonprofit composed of Republicans and Democrats that's responsible for distributing federal dollars out to local stations.

Allison Perlman, University of California, Irvine: The vision of public broadcasting was that it was a decentralized network of local stations, and local stations themselves should really be at the heart of what public media was.

William Brangham:

Almost instantly, public broadcasting began featuring a kind of television no one in the U.S. had seen before, children's programming like "Sesame Street" and "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood."

(Singing)

William Brangham:

Arts and culture shows like "The French Chef with Julia Child."

Julia Child, Chef:

And this is going to be an all-purpose batter.

William Brangham:

And "Masterpiece Theater."

Man:

By five modern English novelists.

William Brangham:

As well as news.

Robert MacNeil, Former Anchor, "PBS NewsHour": Good evening from Washington.

William Brangham:

In 1973, Robert MacNeil teamed up with Jim Lehrer for gavel-to-gavel coverage of the Watergate hearings. That broadcast eventually became "The MacNeil/Lehrer Report" and later the "PBS News Hour."

Geoff Bennett:

Good evening. I'm Geoff Bennett.

Amna Nawaz:

And I'm Amna Nawaz.

William Brangham:

But there was always something missing, a permanent funding mechanism. The original Carnegie report had suggested a tax on TV sales to make sure the money wasn't ensnared in the yearly appropriations battle, but that didn't make it into the 1967 law.

Allison Perlman:

When the Public Broadcasting Act passed with no real plan in place to politically insulate public media, it set the stage for, I think, six decades now of threats to public media funding, often for political reasons.

William Brangham:

So public broadcasting had to regularly fight for its funding. In 1969, one of its biggest stars testified on Capitol Hill.

Fred Rogers, "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood": I feel that if we in public television can only make it clear that feelings are mentionable and manageable, we will have done a great service.

Man:

I think it's wonderful. Looks like you just earned the $20 million.

(Laughter)

(Applause)

William Brangham:

But the fight never stopped.

Allison Perlman:

In the 1990s, what we see are social conservatives who have anxiety about the political direction of some public television programming joining forces with economic conservatives who think that the transformations in the media landscape that had taken place from 1967 to the present no longer required federal support.

The mix of an economic rationale with a cultural rationale to try to dismantle federal support for public media continues throughout the successive decades.

William Brangham:

Every Republican administration, except Gerald Ford's, has tried to cut public media funding. Here's what then-presidential candidate Mitt Romney said in a 2012 debate moderated by Jim Lehrer.

Fmr. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT):

I'm sorry, Jim. I'm going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I'm going to stop other things. I like PBS. I love Big Bird. Actually like you too.

William Brangham:

In his first term, President Trump proposed defunding public media. This year, Republicans have introduced multiple bills to do the same.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA):

Government doesn't need to subsidize the media anymore because the world's changed. But I still probably wouldn't object that much if the reporting by these entities was fair and was balanced. But it is not.

William Brangham:

We should note here, independent analyses have found both PBS and NPR to be among the most objective and reliable news sources in America.

But back to the question of funding. For 2025, Congress appropriated $535 million to CPB. That's less than 1/100th of a percent out of the total federal budget. It costs, on average, per American, a little over $1.50 a year. Most of those funds are distributed to some 1,500 local stations nationwide, which produce shows themselves and pay NPR and PBS for the rights to Air National shows.

But federal funding makes up just a fraction of public media's budgets. The average public radio station gets about 8 percent of its revenue from the CPB appropriation. For TV stations, it's roughly 17 percent.

So, to make up the difference, the system relies heavily on donations, grants, and sponsorships.

Victor Pickard:

The U.S. is almost literally off the chart for how little we allocate towards our public media. At the federal level, it comes out to a little over $1.50 per person per year. Compare that to the Brits, who spend roughly $100 per person per year for the BBC. Northern European countries spend well over $100 per person per year.

And it really shows in the health of their of their public broadcasting systems. They tend to view those systems as essential democratic infrastructure. And, indeed, data show that there is a positive correlation between the health of a public broadcasting system and the health of a democratic governance.

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Now on "Frontline."

William Brangham:

Federal funding today helps pay for everything from investigative documentaries on "Frontline" to full-length live concerts. It funds historical dramas and Ken Burns' historical films.

Announcer:

That bring our history to life.

Victor Pickard:

Public broadcasting also provides emergency broadcasting services. It's often the last source of news and information during moments of natural disaster. It's committed to this kind of universal service mission that, again, a commercial media system is very unlikely to adhere to.

William Brangham:

And that mission reaches 99 percent of the country, with public media stations broadcasting everywhere from South Florida to Northern Alaska.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm William Brangham.