> President Donald Trump issued an executive order aiming to end federal support of NPR and PBS “to the maximum extent allowed by law.”<p>AFAICT, if this goes through (i.e. government personnel follow Trump's request to do something maybe-illegal) it would affect ~1% of NPR's funding and ~16% of PBS'.<p>> "The order’s legality is dubious at best — Congress appropriates funds for public broadcasting, and the president doesn’t get a magic eraser for programs he doesn’t like."<p>This kind of "the law says the money shall be used for something, but <i>I dun wanna</i>" problem, Presidential abuse of impoundments, was also a contributing factor in Nixon's impeachment. [0] [1]<p>___<p>[0] <a href="https://protectdemocracy.org/work/impoundment-threat-explained/" rel="nofollow">https://protectdemocracy.org/work/impoundment-threat-explain...</a><p>[1] <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/02/16/presidential-impoundment-trump-nixon-history/" rel="nofollow">https://foreignpolicy.com/2025/02/16/presidential-impoundmen...</a>
And Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s response, 500+ comments: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869546">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43869546</a>