Overview

• Vice President J.D. Vance broke a 50-50 Senate tie to advance President Trump’s rescissions bill that would eliminate over $1 billion in federal grants to PBS, NPR and the CPB.
• Paula Kerger told CNN on Wednesday that she “can’t make any sense” of allegations that PBS has a liberal bias, pointing out that news programming represents about 10% of its schedule.
• Kerger cited children’s shows such as Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood to illustrate the network’s focus on educational content rather than political advocacy.
• A White House fact sheet highlighted PBS’s six-month usage of the term “far right” 162 times versus six uses of “far left” and reported that the network gave the Republican National Convention predominantly negative coverage.
• The tie-breaking vote was needed after GOP Sens. Lisa Murkowski, Mitch McConnell and Susan Collins opposed advancing the measure, underscoring divisions within Republican ranks.