Senate set to debate cuts to NPR, PBS and foreign aid

The Senate voted by a razor-thin margin late Tuesday to advance debate on a package of funding cuts requested by President Donald Trump. They're aimed at clawing back $1.1 billion previously allocated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, along with $7.9 billion earmarked for international efforts to combat famine and disease.

Vice President JD Vance had to be called to the floor to cast the tie-breaking vote after Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins deadlocked the chamber as they joined all Democrats in voting against the measure.

The vote follows approval in the House last month for the president's request. But the Senate Appropriations Committee removed PEPFAR, the U.S. AIDS relief program begun by President George W. Bush, from the package of cuts, according to Senate Majority Leader John Thune.

Ahead of the roll call, Alaska's Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski said she would vote no on the cuts requested by the Trump administration through an unusual procedure known as rescission.

"It's not that I don't think we should be doing more to oversee our budget or bring spending levels down," she said. "But we also need to do more as legislators — as senators — when it comes to our own constitutional authority, the power of the purse."

"My colleagues know I've been a strong supporter of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. I'll continue to be a strong supporter," Murkowski added: "If you think there's too much bias at NPR, let's address that. But you don't need to gut the entire Corporation for Public Broadcasting."

The cuts to CPB, which is the conduit for federal funds to both NPR and PBS, remain.

However, negotiations with the White House produced a plan on Tuesday to continue directly funding 28 public radio stations serving Native American communities in nine states. Those funds would come from a Department of Interior program, according to Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., who in a post on X thanked Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought "for working with us to favorably resolve this issue."

"This has got to be resolved because this is where — in these rural areas — they get their emergency services, they get their announcements. They're not political in nature," Rounds said at an appropriations committee hearing.

Posting on X, Rounds said: "We worked with the Trump administration to find Green New Deal money that could be reallocated to continue grants to tribal radio stations without interruption."

But in a letter to Rounds reviewed by NPR news, Native Public Radio President and CEO Loris Taylor called the compromise "structurally impractical."

Taylor said that Native Public Radio appreciates the efforts to sustain Tribal media, but that "The Green New Deal is primarily a framework for climate and economic reform, not a dedicated funding source for communications infrastructure or media services."

"There is no clear path for redirecting these funds to Tribal broadcasters without significant legislative and administrative changes," Taylor wrote.

Congress has a midnight Friday deadline for approving the rescission package or the cuts expire. Because of the changes made to the House version of the rescission, if the Senate approves it, the package will go back to the House for a final vote.

The House approved the package on a largely party-line vote. But in a recent Senate appropriations hearing on the rescission, several Republican senators pressed for changes in the $9.4 billion in spending cuts the OMB asked Congress to eliminate. They raised concerns about the impact of the proposed cuts on public radio and television stations in their states and warned that zeroing out federal support would turn many communities into news deserts. Some senators proposed that cuts could be scaled back or new parameters could be added by Congress for the way funds are distributed.

Some Senate Republicans, such as the chair of the appropriations committee, Susan Collins of Maine, have criticized NPR, arguing that its news coverage is politically biased, but suggested the rescission request could be tweaked to continue supporting local public media stations.

In a statement late Tuesday, Collins said: "The rescissions package has a big problem — nobody really knows what program reductions are in it. That isn't because we haven't had time to review the bill. Instead, the problem is that OMB has never provided the details that would normally be part of this process."

"I share the frustration with the biased reporting by NPR, and I would support defunding it. Nevertheless, local TV and radio stations continue to provide important coverage," Collins said.

In past statements, NPR and PBS have defended the value of public broadcasting and pushed back on accusations of bias.

Last week, Trump threatened to withhold his endorsement for any Republican who opposed the rescissions package. Posting on his social media platform, the president wrote: "It is very important that all Republicans adhere to my Recissions Bill and, in particular, DEFUND THE CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING (PBS and NPR), which is worse than CNN & MSDNC put together."

Earlier Tuesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, urged his Senate colleagues to pass the version sent them by the House. "We're encouraging our Senate partners over there to get the job done and to pass it as is," Johnson said at a news conference.

Collins and other Republicans like Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., were among those who raised concerns about cutting foreign assistance programs such as PEPFAR — the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief — aimed at combating the HIV/AIDS epidemic. They noted that the program has saved millions of lives.

The package is the Trump administration's first attempt to formalize some of the cuts that the Department of Government Efficiency, or "DOGE," announced on its own. Vought, the OMB director, also said the administration was considering additional rescissions packages to submit in the coming months.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, speaking on the Senate floor, said Tuesday that Americans rely on public broadcasting for weather alerts, adding that "these cuts couldn't come at a worse time."

"So why the hell is the administration so obsessed with cutting these lifesaving services when they are critical for keeping people safe?" he asked.

Any proposed changes to the bill must first be approved by the Senate parliamentarian, due to the fast-track process Republicans are using to pass it with a simple majority. When debate begins, senators will be allowed to offer amendments during a vote-a-rama, which may last for hours.

Disclosure: This story was written and reported by NPR Correspondent Scott Neuman and Congressional Correspondent Deirdre Walsh. It was edited by Managing Editors Vickie Walton-James and Gerry Holmes. 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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