Judge blocks Trump from firing Voice of America staff

The president slashed federal funding to the US media arm described by his adviser as “a giant rot and burden to the American taxpayer”

A US district judge has issued a restraining order against President Donald Trump’s effort to downsize the federal agency that bankrolls Voice of America, the WWII-era broadcaster later retooled by the CIA into a Cold War propaganda weapon.

In mid-March, Trump ordered sweeping cuts at VOA’s parent organization, the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), as part of a broader push to reduce federal waste and realign foreign aid and other soft power initiatives with the administration’s “America First” doctrine. The executive order also targeted Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), another USAGM entity founded in the early 1950s as two separate CIA front organizations.

In response, VOA journalists, unions, and press freedom NGOs sued the agency and its leadership, warning that the broadcaster – which has “promoted America’s democratic ideals abroad since World War II” – would suffer “irreparable harm,” while its foreign employees could face “deportation to their home countries.”

Read more

On Friday, District Judge James Paul Oetken issued a temporary restraining order barring the Trump administration from terminating the contracts of roughly 1,200 VOA employees who were placed on leave earlier this month.

The judge prohibited USAGM from implementing Trump’s order and from “proceeding with any further attempt to terminate, reduce-in-force, place on leave, or furlough any USAGM employee or contractor.” The ruling also blocks the agency from terminating federal grants or contracts, or shuttering existing offices.

Trump-appointed senior USAGM adviser Kari Lake defended the cuts earlier this month, calling the agency “not salvageable.” 

“From top to bottom, this agency is a giant rot and burden to the American taxpayer – a national security risk for this nation – and irretrievably broken,” she said.

READ MORE: Why has Trump finally pulled the plug on deep state propaganda?

Elon Musk, Trump’s government efficiency czar, also advocated for shuttering VOA and RFE/RL back in February. The CIA-linked broadcasters had value during the Cold War, he argued, but “nobody listens to them anymore.” He described the outlets as “radical left crazy people talking to themselves while torching $1B a year of US taxpayer money.”