CDT Joins Groups Urging U.S. to Protect Press Freedom and Keep Journalists Safe After Order to Gut USAGM
CDT joined the Committee to Protect Journalists and more than 30 other news and civil society organizations calling on the United States to support and protect press freedom in the wake of a March 14 executive order issued by President Trump, which called for the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) to be “eliminated to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law” as part of ongoing efforts to reduce “the elements of the Federal bureaucracy that the President has determined are unnecessary.”
USAGM is a U.S. federal agency whose mandate is drawn from several laws. It oversees broadcast entities including Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, Radio Free Asia, and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks. For decades, USAGM-funded entities have played a vital role in providing news and information to people living under authoritarian regimes. To abandon them will undermine democracy around the world.
As the statement says, “it is vital that Congress protect USAGM, ensure the safety of its affiliate journalists, and reaffirm the U.S. government’s commitment to a free and independent media at home and abroad.”
