Congress just greenlit a massive $9 billion cut to public broadcasting and foreign aid at President Trump’s request.
Newsmax reported that in a razor-thin victory, the House of Representatives finalized approval early Friday for a bill slashing roughly $9 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and various foreign aid initiatives, following Senate passage a day earlier, now awaiting Trump’s signature to seal the deal.
The Senate pushed the measure through in the wee hours of Thursday with a tight 51-48 vote, not a single Democrat on board.
Republicans held the line with their 53-47 majority, sidestepping the usual 60-vote filibuster threshold thanks to the bill’s status as a White House-triggered rescission request.
Two GOP senators, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, broke ranks to join the opposition.
By Friday, the House followed suit, passing the bill 216-213 after a delay sparked by Democrats pressing for a vote on unrelated Jeffrey Epstein files. Again, zero Democrats supported the measure, leaving Republicans to carry the weight of this historic funding rollback—the first successful presidential rescission in decades.
The cuts are staggering: $1.1 billion stripped from the CPB, wiping out its funding for the next two budget years, and nearly $8 billion axed from foreign aid programs.
That foreign aid slash includes $800 million for refugee emergency services, $496 million for disaster-hit regions, and a whopping $4.15 billion for economic and democratic development abroad. It’s a bold move, but is it prioritizing American taxpayers or abandoning global goodwill?
The CPB cut hits hard, as it funnels over two-thirds of its budget to more than 1,500 local public TV and radio stations, with the rest propping up national programming through NPR and PBS.
Lawmakers from rural districts are already sounding alarms about local stations potentially going dark. Meanwhile, during Tuesday’s Senate debate, a 7.3 magnitude earthquake off Alaska’s coast proved the point—local public stations broadcast critical tsunami warnings.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski didn’t mince words, highlighting the lifeline these stations provide: “Not just your news—it is your tsunami alert.” Her point stings—cutting public media isn’t just about budgets; it’s about safety in remote corners of the country. Yet, the White House counters that the system reeks of political bias and wastes taxpayer dollars, a claim many on the right nod to with approval.
House Speaker Mike Johnson echoed that sentiment, declaring, “We need to get back to fiscal sanity.” Fair enough, but when sanity means gutting disaster alerts and local news for rural America, one wonders if the cure is worse than the disease.
The timing of this cut, right after a $3.3 trillion debt-boosting tax and spending bill per the Congressional Budget Office, feels like a fiscal sleight of hand.
Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries fired back, saying, “No one is buying the notion that Republicans are actually trying to improve wasteful spending.”
He’s got a point—skeptics see this as less about prudence and more about scoring political points. Still, with no Democrat votes in either chamber and failed attempts to restore funding, their objections couldn’t stop the train.
On the foreign aid front, the White House argues these reductions will push other nations to step up during humanitarian crises, framing it as a win for American taxpayers.
Rep. Virginia Foxx reinforced this, stating, “The money that we're clawing back is the people's money.” Admirable in theory, but slashing funds for refugee shelters and disaster relief might leave the U.S. looking stingy on the world stage.
Some concessions were made—Senate GOP leaders dropped a $400 million cut to PEPFAR, the HIV/AIDS relief program, after pushback from within their own ranks.
Meanwhile, Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota brokered a deal to redirect Interior Department funds to support Native American public radio stations across a dozen states. It’s a small lifeline, but as Kate Riley of America’s Public Television Stations noted, it’s “at best a short-term, half-measure.”
Not all Republicans are cheering without reservation—Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker cautioned, “Let’s not make a habit of this.” His wariness about the White House’s lack of detailed justification for specific cuts is a reminder that even fiscal hawks want transparency.
Still, Russ Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, seemed unfazed, telling reporters, “We’re happy to go to great lengths to get this thing done.” That determination is classic Trump-era tenacity, pushing through controversial reforms no matter the noise. But with such narrow votes, the administration might find future battles less forgiving.