Trump public media cuts could hit rural America

Last winter, a strong storm hit northeastern Alaska. Kotzebue residents have about 3,000 towns and are accustomed to polar conditions, so Desiree Hagan still has to go to work.

“The snow was so strong that you couldn’t see in front of you,” Ms. Hagen recalled. “I was walking backwards to work.”

Ms. Hagan is a reporter for Kotz Public Radio, which is located in Kotzebue and its 12 surrounding villages.

She also happens to be the only American journalist in the Arctic circle, so she had to broadcast it as the storm intensified.

“It’s time now, I have to report on this,” Ms Hagen recalled. “We have to make sure we know where people can go. Oh, the motor is out. Okay, the airport is flooded now.”

“Winter is not a joke, it’s life and death,” she told the BBC. “As a reporter, I try not to make emotional statements, for example, if I’m not here, people may die, but that’s the reality.”

However, on the other side of Washington, D.C., a historic vote could end federal support for Coates.

The Senate must decide this weekend whether to return $1.1 billion (£800 million) from the company for public broadcasting, which has allocated federal funds to public broadcasting and television stations.

While cuts to public media are part of a wide range of spending packages, including the removal of $8.3 billion demand from U.S. international development agencies and other foreign aid programs, they are particularly precious to President Donald Trump, who often accuses the media of bias.

The president is now threatening to remove support from any Republican senators who do not support the cuts.

Trump released Truth Social, which is very important that all Republicans stick to my inclusion bill, especially funding to public broadcasters (PBS and NPR), which is more than the CNN & MSDNC. ”

Executives at National Public Radio (NPR) and Public Broadcasting Systems (PBS) reject allegations of bias and say they comply with all news standards.

According to the Pew Research Center, Republican voters are three times more likely to consume or trust news reports than Democrats.

While the cuts will affect national broadcasters such as NPR and PBS, more than 70% of federal funds are used in local media sites, while about 45% of stations that receive funding in 2023 are in rural areas.

For half of rural radio stations, federal grants constitute a quarter or more of their income. In Kotz, Kotzebue, public funds account for 41% of its revenue.

The cuts’ impact on rural voters have turned some senators down.

“There will never be a guarantee of passage in the Senate, where many Republican senators represent rural countries that do benefit from public broadcasters,” said Democratic Congressman Dan Goldman.

Alaska Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski said she opposed cuts to public media sites, warning: “It turns out that seemingly rash expenses seem to be a valuable resource to save life in Alaska.”

“There is almost a number, they say they will be phased out if public broadcast funds are no longer available,” Merkowski told a Senate hearing last month.

Other Republican senators, including Susan Collins of Maine and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, expressed concern about cutting foreign aid programs.

Cutting down funds for federal public broadcasting has been a Republican administration’s ambition for decades, often raised during President Trump’s first term.

“It is a dispatch attitude to ask conservative Americans to pay for their services that ridicule them,” said Mike Gonzalez, a senior researcher at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. Last year, a senior NPR editor resigned after accusing Channel of favoring the left-wing voice.

Gonzalez wrote a chapter In the policy blueprint in the 2025 project Call for an end to all federal public media funding.

“If there is a demand for local news, the market will meet the market,” Gonzalez said. “The idea that taxpayers are the only surviving business model, and I don’t think that’s the case.”

According to Northwestern University, the number of U.S. counties without local news sources has risen to 206, with 1,561 counties having only one source.

Nearly 55 million Americans now live in these news deserts, three-quarters of which are mainly rural.

Rural American strongly supported Donald Trump in the November election, leading some to claim that the president’s own voters could be hit the biggest hit by the cuts by public media.

Travis Bubenik is the news director for Marfa Public Radio in rural Texas. Almost every county aired on the station voted for Republicans in the last election.

Mr Bubenik said that where it is angry with the public media, it is targeting the state media.

“What I know is that based on my experience with local radio stations, people talk to me, they like what we are doing, they know we are local, we live here, we care about the area,” he said.

One-third of Marfa Public Radio’s funding comes from federal grants that are now threatened.

“It’s scary,” Mr. Bubnik admitted. “In the near future, this station may either deviate from the air or be unable to do the quantity and quality of local news.”

The bill must pass through the Senate by July 18, and any changes must be approved by the House before it can enter Trump’s table. If four Republicans decide not to vote for the bill, they won’t move forward.

Desiree Hagan watched the iceberg floating beside the windows of her office in Kotzebue, hoping that the senator would cross the aisle. She tried not to consider alternatives.

“Even if there are some dead air moments here, people think, ‘What’s wrong?” Ms. Hagen laughed.

About 90% of her audience is Inupiat, a local community in Alaska. Most of the programming is provided by elders in the inupiat language.

“Stations are so intertwined into communities,” Ms Hagen said. “These cuts will have a ripple effect in all aspects of society.”

“It will be devastating,” she added.