Press freedom and journalists’ freedom
“Dozens of VOA staffers in Washington are on J-1 visas, and if they lose them, they may have to return to countries whose governments have a record of jailing critics….
“VOA was the only news outlet I knew of with a dedicated desk to cover press freedom issues. Weeks ago we began working on an in-depth series for World Press Freedom Day, in May. I joked that we would be fired before then. Then it happened….
“VOA got its start beaming stories about freedom and democracy into occupied Europe during World War II. Now the website hasn’t been updated in days, as if time has stopped, and some broadcasts have been replaced by music, leaving our weekly audience of more than 350 million people every week without the news we’ve long delivered.
“VOA is not perfect; no news outlet is. And while Lake says USAGM is ‘a giant rot,’ I’m proud of the work that my colleagues and I did as we remained committed to accurate, fair reporting.”
—“The Last Days at Voice of America,” Columbia Journalism Review, Liam Scott, March 18, 2025
Chinese Communist Party: “so-called beacon of freedom”
“ ‘The so-called beacon of freedom, VOA, has now been discarded by its own government like a dirty rag,’ the Global Times, which is known for its nationalistic commentary, said in an editorial over the weekend following Trump’s defunding of the news outlets.
“The daily tabloid described VOA as a ‘carefully crafted propaganda machine’
whose ‘primary function is to serve Washington’s need to attack other countries based on ideological demands’.
“The comments were echoed by former Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin, who described the dismantling of the outlets as ‘really gratifying’ in a post on microblogging site Weibo….
“ ‘Both RFA and VOA do something that basically no one else does, which is reach audiences inside China through non-internet means,’ Bethany Allen, head of the programme for China investigations and analysis at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, told Al Jazeera.
“VOA TV broadcasts and RFA radio reach people who otherwise would not have access to independent information. Many censorship circumvention tools are now illegal in China and thus risky to use, and they are also too complicated for people who aren’t internet savvy,’ Allen added….
“[David Bandurski, director of the Taiwan-based China Media Project:] ‘I have met many Chinese journalists and editors over the past 20 years who remembered listening to VOA on their shortwaves in the 1980s…. It was a liberalising force.’ ”
—“Chinese state media revel in demise of Voice of America, Radio Free Asia,” Al Jazeera, Erin Hale, March 19, 2025
Chinese Communist Party, champion of truth and access
“VOA’s fate has provided a lesson: Concocting biases does not bring real influence and lies can never replace facts…. Unfortunately [sic], prejudice can never replace facts, and fictional stories cannot rewrite history. When people can freely access information, lies will eventually fade away.”
—“VOA a biased lens, never ‘an important window’ into China,” Global Times (editorial), March 19, 2025
Radio Free Asia’s appeal to Congress
“Dear Members of the U.S. Congress: With deep concern and indignation, we strongly urge the U.S. Congress to take immediate action to prevent the closure of Radio Free Asia (RFA). This decision is not only a serious blow to press freedom, but also a great damage to the core values and national interests of the United States….
“Radio Free Asia also provides important support for the United States’ own national security. It has repeatedly exposed the CCP’s cyber warfare and offline infiltration operations against the United States, reminding the US government and society to guard against the CCP’s global expansion. Now, the US government’s cut in funding is equivalent to weakening its own defense capabilities, making it easier for the CCP’s foreign propaganda to create a public opinion war in the Chinese American community.”
—“Radio Free Asia: An Appeal to the US Congress,” Bitter Winter, March 24, 2025
Russia: “awesome decision by Trump”
“ ‘This is an awesome decision by Trump!’ said Margarita Simonyan, editor of Russia’s RT network. ‘We couldn’t shut them down, unfortunately, but America did so itself.’
“The Kremlin did not comment but current and former Russian officials told independent media outlet The Moscow Times that it was glad to see the outlets go.
“In recent years, the Kremlin was “especially irritated” by RFE/RL’s attempts to undermine “the wartime censorship Moscow imposed after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine” in Russia and former Soviet countries, the news outlet said.”
—“Trump mutes Voice of America, makes space for Russian and Chinese influence,” France24, Sébastian SEIBT, March 19, 2025
The right call
“As a former news correspondent for Voice of America, I retired in 2014 after 34 years with VOA and its parent, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, or USAGM. I have written many reports and commentaries about the agency….
“VOA and other taxpayer-funded media did some good things over the decades, including during the Cold War….
“I have monitored the agency’s bureaucracy along with many of its reporters and concluded that it has essentially become a hubris-filled rogue operation often reflecting a leftist bias aligned with partisan national media. It has sought to avoid accountability for violations of journalistic standards and mismanagement.”
—“Voice of America, Global Media Agency are rightly in budget cut bull’s-eye,” Washington Times, Dan Robinson, November 27, 2024
The silence
“Journalists dismissed by the Trump administration’s gutting of the federally funded Voice of America broadcaster ‘will not be silenced,’ said Metropolitan Archbishop Borys A. Gudziak of the Archeparchy of Philadelphia. ‘We are ashamed that America is silencing its own voice,’ he added.”
—“Gudziak: America ‘silencing its own voice’ with VOA shutdown,” Our Sunday Visitor Newsweekly/OSV News, Gina Christian, March 21, 2025
Also see:
The White House: The Voice of Radical America
The White House: Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy
