WASHINGTON, DC – On Friday, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)—the ACLU of the District of Columbia (ACLU-DC), the ACLU of Colorado (ACLU-CO), and the ACLU of Minnesota (ACLU-MN)—filed an amicus brief urging the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to block President Donald Trump’s enforcement of his recent executive order, according to an ACLU press release.
The executive order would defund National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), stated the ACLU press release. Trump’s order, titled “Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media,” directs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and other federal agencies to cut all funds to NPR and PBS.
The press release reported that the move is in retaliation for the broadcasters’ journalistic and editorial decisions. The executive order describes the programs as “biased” and “partisan,” and seeks to eliminate not only direct funding but also indirect funds for networks that associate with them.
Both PBS and NPR have filed lawsuits against the order, the ACLU said. A fact sheet included in the order outlines its targeting of the networks for their programming choices regarding transgender rights, public health, and political investigations.
According to the ACLU, this shows the order is rooted in viewpoint-based animus. The amicus briefs submitted by the ACLU support the motions for summary judgment in those lawsuits.
The briefs argue that the executive order violates the First Amendment by retaliating against protected speech. This includes the words and stories the organizations choose to broadcast.
“Just as the government cannot shut down a newspaper because it dislikes its editorials, it may not defund NPR and PBS because it disapproves of their reporting,” said Arthur Spitzer, senior counsel at the ACLU of the District of Columbia. “Retaliating against journalists for doing their job is the antithesis of democracy and a clear violation of the freedom of press,” he said in the press release.
The briefs also contend that the order unlawfully restricts funding Congress had already appropriated for public broadcasters. By conditioning the use of these funds on content, the ACLU argues, the order is unconstitutional.
“We don’t have a Ministry of Propaganda in the United States,” said Brian Hauss, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “The First Amendment prohibits President Trump from withholding federal funds expressly appropriated to support the free and independent press as punishment for news coverage he hates,” he said.
The ACLU maintains that while the government can fund its own speech, it cannot penalize others for differing views. This includes denying subsidies intended to support noncommercial, independent programming.
The press release noted that NPR’s “All Things Considered” is the most listened-to afternoon news program in the country. PBS’ “NewsHour” attracts 2.1 million nightly viewers.
Both programs are crucial to public discourse, the ACLU said. “NPR, Colorado Public Radio, and other public radio stations help ensure that communities across the country are informed and can engage in civic life,” said Tim Macdonald, legal director at the ACLU of Colorado.
“Punishing public media because the government does not like their reporting is characteristic of autocracies seeking to deprive communities of information, not democracies,” Macdonald said in the release.
The ACLU said defunding PBS and NPR would deprive communities of access to news, educational children’s programming, cultural content, and artistic expression.
“Simply put, this executive order is a violation of the First Amendment,” said ACLU-MN legal director Teresa Nelson. “President Trump is free to voice his disagreements with PBS, NPR, and any other media outlet’s programming, but he cannot use the power of the presidency to arbitrarily defund media organizations he dislikes,” she said.
The ACLU warned the order undermines the Public Broadcasting Act and threatens the editorial independence of local public broadcasters. It also endangers the infrastructure of the Public Radio Satellite System, which reaches more than 99 percent of the U.S. population and plays a key role in emergency alerts, the release stated.
