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Late last week, 5th District Congressman Bob Good introduced the ‘Defund NPR Act’, arguing that tax dollars shouldn’t be used to support the operation. This legislation would prohibit federal funding of NPR and stop local public radio stations from using federal grant money to purchase content or pay dues to NPR. 

“It is bad enough that so many media outlets push their slanted views instead of reporting the news, but it is even more egregious for hardworking taxpayers to be forced to pay for it. National Public Radio has a track record of promoting anti-American narratives on the taxpayer dime,” Good claimed. 

NPR was originally created to be an educational news source and to “speak with many voices, many dialects.” In the 55 years since NPR was founded, Good argued the group has become a primary outlet for advancing biased and radical media coverage of political and social issues. On April 10, former NPR editor Uri Berliner issued a scathing review of the news outlet, claiming it has “lost America’s trust.” Berliner resigned from NPR shortly after due to what he called a lack of viewpoint diversity and a hard embrace of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) principles. He pointed to the fact in 2021, NPR had a staff of 87 Democrats and no Republicans. Berliner also pointed out on July 4, 2022, NPR broke a 33-year tradition of reading the Declaration of Independence and instead focused on Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, and his relationship with his slave Sally Hemmings. 

Under current law, NPR is able to receive even more taxpayer dollars than are specifically authorized for the outlet, because any public radio station that receives federal grants must use 26 percent of the funds for production or the acquisition of programming, including programming for national distribution. These stations commonly use funds to buy programming from NPR – further funding NPR’s operation.