NPR challenges CPB’s authority to redirect millions in funding

NPR has asked a federal judge in D.C. to block the Corporation for Public Broadcasting from transferring millions in satellite funding to a newly formed nonprofit run by a coalition of public media organizations.

The legal filing Friday came just hours after CPB announced it was awarding as much as $57.9 million over five years to Public Media Infrastructure (PMI), the nonprofit group that counts such radio mainstays as New York Public Radio, American Public Media and PRX as founding partners. The grant, it said, would provide “reliable interconnection services” plus infrastructure to support distributing, measuring and monetizing radio and digital content.

CPB was established under the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967; it distributes congressionally appropriated funds to NPR, PBS, and public radio and TV stations around the country. This past spring, President Donald Trump signed an executive order meant to force the nonprofit group to halt all funding to NPR and PBS due to what he called “biased” content. NPR and PBS each sued the government, but Trump ultimately halted most federal funding for public media through a summer rescission package that eliminated $1.1 billion set aside for CPB over the next two years.

NPR argued in its court filing that CPB, which is set to wind down operations starting with mass cuts in the coming days, has carried out an executive order that it considers illegal by doling out congressionally appropriated satellite funds to another group. U.S. District Judge Randolph D. Moss, an appointee of President Barack Obama, is hearing NPR’s case against the government.

NPR’s legal argument also maintained that the Public Broadcasting Act requires satellite interconnection funding to go to the “national entity” designated by participating public radio stations, which NPR says has meant it for decades.

NPR’s court filing noted that its current grant agreement with CPB expires Tuesday, the end of the fiscal year. It argued that once CPB distributes the funds to the new group, PMI, they’re unlikely to be recovered due to CPB winding down.

The dispute could represent a significant shift in public radio ecosystem. For decades, NPR has managed the Public Radio Satellite System (PRSS), which serves the public radio system, but the new organization, PMI, could challenge that control.

In an email to staff Friday, NPR chief executive Katherine Maher said that NPR has been the “steward” of PRSS for more than 40 years, and that CPB has a statutory obligation to disburse funds that Congress earmarked for the system.

“While the topic of technical infrastructure is far less evocative than the topic of editorial freedom, the First Amendment principles of our case are not any less valid: It is viewpoint discrimination, and unlawful, for the federal government to restrict funding, of any kind, on the basis of distaste for our programming and content,” Maher said. “And it is our obligation to challenge any such restriction, whether the funding relates to technical infrastructure or investigative newsgathering.”

Maher said she takes exception to NPR needing to resolve the issue in court because of the important role CPB has played in the public media ecosystem. “The decision has undercut the bonds between our two organizations forged over many decades of service to the American people, and stands as a regretful coda to CPB’s prior history of support for the First Amendment,” Maher wrote. Despite this, Maher said she spoke to the leadership of PMI, the new nonprofit, and said NPR is committed to working with the group in the future.

A CPB spokesperson said the organization is confident that its actions are in the best interest of the public media system.

“We are disappointed that, at a time of tremendous challenge for all public media with substantially diminished resources, NPR is forcing CPB to expend scarce funds that would otherwise support the public media system in defending a lawsuit that has no merits and ultimately does not benefit the system,” the spokesperson said.

Judge Moss set a hearing on the motion for Tuesday – the last day that CPB will be fully operational.