NPR and Colorado public radio stations sue Trump White House

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: NPR

May 27, 2025 8:07 AM ET


NPR and three Colorado public radio stations filed suit Tuesday morning in federal court against the Trump White House over the president's executive order purportedly barring the use of Congressionally appropriated funds for NPR and PBS.

"It is not always obvious when the government has acted with a retaliatory purpose in violation of the First Amendment. 'But this wolf comes as a wolf,'" states the legal brief for the public broadcasters. "The Order targets NPR and PBS expressly because, in the President's view, their news and other content is not 'fair, accurate, or unbiased.'"

The line about the "wolf" was drawn from a 1988 dissent by the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

The lawsuit says the administration is usurping Congress' right to direct how federal money will be spent and to pass laws. It names President Trump, White House budget director Russel Vought, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Maria Rosario Jackson, the chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, as defendants. The White House did not immediately have a comment on the suit.

Read more: https://www.npr.org/2025/05/27/nx-s1-5413094/npr-public-radio-lawsuit-trump-funding-ban

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Link to SUIT (PDF viewer) - https://apps.npr.org/documents/document.html?id=25953971-npr-and-colorado-public-radio-stations-lawsuit-against-trump-administration

As an interesting note - they linked to the statute that applies to the CPB - https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/398

[getagrip_already]

1. maybe they shouldn't have worked so hard to elect him.....

Just saying.

[defacto7]

2. Where do people get the idea that NPR tried to elect Trump?

I listen every morning. No such thing. Stations have local news edged between national broadcasts, but even here in red Utah there hasn't been anything unbiased in their local broadcast. They do report our red state house activity which is factual and they also report the Democratic positions as well. They are the only straightforward, reliable source of real news on the air that we have here and can rely upon. If you want biased left wing info there's plenty on the web. If you want biased right wing info there's a massive amount of that around as we know. If you want the facts, NPR is outstanding in delivering it to both urban and rural listeners and, god knows, the rural people are otherwise starved of reality without it.

Give some data supporting your assumption, please, because I haven't heard such a thing.

[getagrip_already]

3. I listen also.....

And it is humiliating how much they supported tsf and the gop.

For example, they would carry not only his full speeches without ever fact checking any part of them, but they would also report excerpts of what he said, with a reporter reading them, with no fact checking.

NPR has steadily headed to the right since the great purge.

Sure, there are reporters who do a good job outside of the news hour, but any reporting done under editorial influence is slanted.

It's been that way for over 2 decades. If you were around to listen to them in the 70's or even early 2000's, you would get it.

[defacto7]

4. Thanks for your comment.

I'm not sure I'm with you on this, but I'll keep my ears open. The 70's were definitely different days. Everything has shifted and we need to shift it back to the left. I don't think undermining NPR helps in that regard since they do show a steady though careful push against the right and that reads to the rural listener who have listened to rw extremism for so long but now are looking for stability again. More extremism on the left, as they'd see anything not GOP, is a turnoff. Steady balanced truth in reporting is what will bring them back because they are scared now. NPR is needed and they are listening.