The Corporation for Public Broadcasting Says Trump Can't End Federal Funding for NPR & PBS

"CPB is not a federal executive agency subject to the President's authority," the corporation wrote in a statement issued Friday morning. "Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government."

The CPB noted that the statute Congress passed to create it "expressly forbade 'any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over educational television or radio broadcasting, or over [CPB] or any of its grantees or contractors."

Congress said that such funds "may be used at the discretion of the recipient" for producing or acquiring programs to put on the air.

Trump's newest order appears to envision a continuation of federal subsidies for public radio and television stations — apart from NPR and PBS. It is unclear how that squares with Trump's pledge to ask Congress to rescind all funds already approved for public broadcasting.

Congress allocates federal funding for CPB and specifies how it shall be spent. The funding is carried out in two-year cycles, ahead of time, a structure designed to help shield public media from political pressure.

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[Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and edited by Deputy Business Editor Emily Kopp, Managing Editor Gerry Holmes and Managing Editor Vickie Walton-James. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.]

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