NPR and PBS Never Needed Your Taxpayer Dollars

By Becket Adams

Sunday, February 01, 2026

 

When Republican lawmakers moved last year to end taxpayer funding for PBS and NPR, a constellation of media CEOs and experts warned that the cuts would result in the closure of dozens, possibly hundreds, of affiliate stations.

 

It has now been six months since President Trump signed a bill eliminating $1.1 billion in federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and the predicted newsroom Armageddon has yet to materialize.

 

In fact, of the more than 1,000 television and radio stations that make up the country’s public media system, nearly all remain operational.

 

“Vanishingly few” affiliates have closed down since last summer, according to the New York Times.

 

This is odd.

 

I distinctly remember being told that the budget cuts would kill us all. No, wait. Sorry. That was net neutrality. The cuts to the CPB, whose chief purpose was to funnel taxpayer dollars into public media, were supposed to trigger a media “apocalypse,” where affiliates would be forced to shut down nationwide, depriving rural Americans of crucial programming such as All Things Considered and 800-plus-word reports on the racially problematic legacy of the thumbs-up emoji.

 

I distinctly remember being told by media experts and the brass at PBS and NPR that a loss of public funding would result in the mass closure of affiliate stations.

 

There was that highly publicized analysis last year by the Public Media Company, which warned that at least 78 public radio and 37 TV stations would likely be forced to shut down.

 

There was also that New York Times analysis that claimed 245 stations in rural communities were “at risk of going off the air.”

 

As of this writing, there has been a single closure since the CPB was defunded. A second closure is expected later this year.

 

NPR President and CEO Katherine Maher, who had no background in journalism before her current role, warned in July of last year that defunding the CPB would cause many “stations to go dark” as soon as next quarter.

 

We’re currently in the first quarter of 2026.

 

CPB CEO Patricia Harrison also cautioned that affiliate stations would have to shut down if they lost access to the public dole.

 

More specifically, Harrison said the cuts would “significantly” affect PBS, adding that the loss of taxpayer dollars “will be especially devastating to smaller stations and those serving large rural areas.”

 

What gives? Why didn’t the mass closures occur as predicted?

 

As it turns out, and to the shock of practically no one on the right, PBS and NPR are perfectly capable of surviving in the open market, even despite the lack of public funding and even despite the official dissolution of the CPB.

 

Listener donations and philanthropic giving have helped to keep the lights on. Emergency grants have also helped. Certain stations have also adopted austerity measures, drawing on reserves and laying off staff.

 

In other words, once publicly funded news organizations are now in the business of managing budgets responsibly and courting private investment — just like every other outlet in the industry.

 

The continued success of NPR and PBS comes not long after NPR, on its first day free of government funding, touted that it was doing just as well as ever, maybe even better.

 

“WE WON’T BE SILENCED,” NPR declared on social media last year.

 

NPR host Leila Fadel also said that day, “We will not easily be silenced. We will continue to be advocates for the truth — for facts. We will ask the questions our listeners, the American public, want the answers to, even if those we’re asking don’t like our questions.”

 

Well, no one is trying to “silence” anyone. As for asking the questions the American public “want the answers to,” that has always been an option. You don’t need a taxpayer subsidy for that.

 

You certainly don’t need millions in public assistance every year when your organization has viable commercial products and a large, built-in audience, as NPR and PBS do.

 

The truth is that neither newsgroup needed regular government handouts. Maybe they did once upon a time, but not today.

 

NPR and PBS are fully capable of standing on their own because they enjoy advantages most newsrooms only dream of: prestige, brand-name products, and an entrenched, nationwide network of affiliates.

 

You were misled when you were told PBS and NPR could hardly survive without taxpayer support. It’s more likely that the CEOs who alleged such a falsehood did so simply because they enjoyed not having to compete seriously in a cutthroat market.

 

Either this or the people who insisted the cuts to the CPB would spell doom for the network affiliates have no idea what they’re talking about.

 

The current media landscape is undoubtedly a difficult and precarious one, as evidenced by the looming layoffs at the Washington Post. Many newsrooms, including NPR and PBS, are suffering from a kind of sugar crash following Trump’s first term.

 

The audiences that once boosted viewership and subscription numbers have since declined, having grown tired of the frenetic but generally substance-free “resistance” reporting.

 

Still, things are not so bad as what was predicted last year for the media entities that previously benefited from the taxpayers’ somewhat involuntary largesse. The worst of it for PBS and NPR is that they now have to compete seriously, on a level playing field, in a highly competitive marketplace.

 

In the words of Detective Lieutenant John McClane: “Welcome to the party, pal.”