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Mr. Trump wants to rid federal funding for the public media and arts.
President Donald Trump’s proposed budget would lacerate federal funding for public media and arts. The 2019 budget would greatly cut the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s budget to a measly $15 million.
This is down from $495 million.
CPB is a private, non-profit that was initiated by Congress back in 1967 in order to support public TV and radio stations like PBS and NPR.
Trump’s budget logic is that the organizations that benefitted from the CPB’s money could “make up the shortfall by increasing revenues from corporate sponsors, foundations and members.”
Back in May of 2017, Congress reimposed the funding to CPB.
These abrasions are not faring well with those affected.
Patricia Harrison, CPB president and CEO, stated, “The elimination of federal funding to CPB would at first devastate, and then ultimately destroy public media’s ability to provide early childhood content, life-saving emergency alerts, and public affairs programs.”
Those in the path of the budget cuts continue to oppose them. Paula Kerger, PBS president and CEO, stated that they and their 350 member stations will once again, “remind leaders in Washington of the significant benefits the public receives in return for federal funding, a modest investment of about $1.35 per citizen, per year.”
CPB and public arts wouldn’t be the only things being axed in the budget.
The National Endowment for the Arts and National Endowment for the Humanities will have their budgets axed from $150 million to $29 million (NEA) and $42 million (NEH). These cuts are in hopes of the agencies to “begin shutting down.”
The NEA’s chairman, Jane Chu, states the following about President Trump’s proposed cuts to the NEA:
“We stand ready to assist in that process as we continue to operate as usual. As a federal government agency, the NEA cannot engage in advocacy, either directly or indirectly. We will, however, continue our practice of educating about the NEA’s vital role in serving our nation’s communities.”
The budget proposal would also make substantial cuts to the National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, and many other domestic agencies. The National Science Foundation’s budget in 2016 was about $7.5 billion. The NSF is in charge of supporting fundamental research and education in non-medical fields of engineering and science.
The budget claims that it “also makes important investments in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education in K-12 schools.”
Considerable amounts would be delegated to defense spending.
Over the course of ten years, the proposed budget would drastically sever Medicare by half a trillion dollars. It would add 13-percent to defense spending. Last but not least, it would add $18 billion for 65 miles of a border wall.
This must still go through Congress. It’s likely that there will be significant renegotiations on a plethora of the proposed cuts. You can read the full, 160-page proposal here.
It was nothing but leftist propaganda programming anyways. I am glad my tax dollars are not funding a Marxist platform.
God Bless Trump.
These agencies (NPR, CPB, NEA, NEH) over the years *have* shifted themselves into a somewhat elitist, and very left-wing corner, so it’s no surprise that they are vulnerable when the administration changes–their existence depends on Dems being in power. However, I strongly suspect most of what’s in this article won’t actually happen. The USA is still nominally a democracy where people’s representatives represent them, instead of a meritocracy (as in Europe) where “experts” run the government and choose what is funded. So people will be complaining, and some cheering, and line items will be adjusted.
“Back in May of 2018, Congress reimposed the funding to CPB.” Should that be “2017”?
Hi, Pebah. Thanks for pointing out the “May of 2018” typo. You are correct. It was supposed to be 2017. Thank you!