PBS is slashing its budget in response to Trump’s war on public media

In an email sent to the directors of the PBS station on Wednesday, the president and chief executive officer of PBS, Paula Kerger, announced that the organization planned to reduce its budget by 21% in order to compensate for some of the financial damage caused by the Trump administration campaign to prevent public media from receiving federal funding which was initially distributed by the CPB. Due to the recently adopted bill, PBS, NPR and all the affiliates of the two organizations will no longer receive the $ 1.1 billion which were previously reserved for them in the next two years.

In addition to the budget cuts, the PBS board of directors also voted in favor of reducing the total amount of contributions it receives from member stations across the country of $ 35 million – a reduction of approximately 15% compared to the $ 227 million originally in June. In addition, PBS gives more time to its member stations to plan how they will collect the funds necessary to pay their contributions, which are determined by a formula which explains the quantity of non -federal funding they receive.

The transition to lower contributions is supposed to facilitate the task of the member stations of PBS – what aerial programming as Sesame Street,, HOUR NEW PBSAnd Find your roots – To cope with some of their own financial charges. But Kerger was also clear in his note that PBS as a whole fights a difficult battle to stay afloat.

“We recognize that even with the reduction of contributions, the adjusted payment calendar and efforts to collect funds for initial financial stabilization, we are all faced with difficult choices about the future,” said Kerger. “We are stronger together, and together, we will continue to stay focused on our mission.”

Although the CPB is about to start wrapping its operations at the end of September, PBS and NPR – which were both historically linked to federal funding to help finance programming and employees to pay – do not disappear, at least, not yet. Earlier this month, NPR said that it reduced its own $ 8 million budget and uses this money to create a “cost relief” fund to help small members meet their needs. But the dismantling of the CPB will put significant pressure on the greatest broadcasters of the American public media, in particular for the stations of smaller members in more rural areas across the country. In the case of PBS, this new budget decrease should also lead to layoffs.