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23h ago

NPR and Colorado Broadcasters File Suit Challenging Trump’s Public Media Funding Cuts

President Trump’s May 1 order is challenged for violating free speech protections, bypassing Congress’s spending authority, with PBS considering its own legal action.

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The headquarters for National Public Radio (NPR) in Washington, DC, March 26, 2025. (Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
FILE - The headquarters for National Public Radio (NPR) is seen in Washington, April 15, 2013. AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)
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Overview

  • On May 27, NPR joined Colorado Public Radio, Aspen Public Radio and KSUT in filing a lawsuit in federal court in Washington, D.C., seeking to block Executive Order 14290.
  • The complaint alleges the order unlawfully targets NPR and PBS for content deemed “biased,” constituting retaliatory, viewpoint-based discrimination in violation of the First Amendment.
  • Plaintiffs contend the president lacks authority to rescind funding expressly appropriated by Congress, arguing the order usurps the legislative branch’s exclusive power of the purse.
  • The suit highlights that NPR receives about 1% of its revenue directly from federal sources and that local stations depend on 8–10% of their budgets from the congressionally authorized, independent Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
  • PBS has not joined the lawsuit but is weighing its own legal response to protect roughly 15% of its funding that flows through the CPB to member stations nationwide.