Dem
47
GOP
53
Donald Trump has tried to kill off the Voice of America, which broadcasts the truth (or did until Kari Lake took over) to millions of people around the world who don't get it from their local media. It is hard to say why telling millions of people America's side of the news and providing them with American music and culture is a bad thing, but Trump hates all media except those outlets that worship at his feet, so it had to go.
VOA started during World War II, when it broadcast stories about democracy to people in Nazi Germany. It now broadcasts in 50 languages and has an audience of 350 million people a week. Its budget ($270 million) is a rounding error in the $6 trillion federal budget.
Naturally, some of the 1,200 people who were summarily fired sued. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Paul Oetken ruled that Trump does not have the authority to shut down VOA just like that. He called the shutdown "arbitrary and capricious," which is a precise legal term pertaining to a government official or body who does something irrationally without even considering the consequences. Patsy Widakuswara, the former White House bureau chief for VOA, said: "We are forcing them to stop their illegal actions. They can shut down VOA but they have to go through Congress, that's how things work." Then she added: "We are supposed to tell America's story to the world. We are not telling only the president's story to the world, that is not in the charter."
One of the reasons Trump is out to get VOA is that during Trump v1.0, its version of the pandemic was not his version of the pandemic. Its version was based on facts and the view of Anthony Fauci, who is not one of Trump's favorite people. (V)