Judge rules Trump order eliminating NPR, PBS funding is unconstitutional

A federal judge in Washington struck down part of President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting funding for NPR and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) on Tuesday, ruling that it was unconstitutional retaliation that violated their press freedom rights under the First Amendment.

The May 1, 2025, executive order, titled “Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media,” cut off funding to public media - with Trump calling out what he perceived as left-wing bias in NPR’s and PBS’s news reporting.

“The message is clear,” U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss, a Barack Obama appointee to the federal bench, wrote in an opinion. “NPR and PBS need not apply for any federal benefit because the President disapproves of their ‘left-wing’ coverage of the news,” he wrote, adding that the action amounted to “viewpoint discrimination.”

The portion of the order stipulated that agency heads “shall identify and terminate, to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law, any direct or indirect funding of NPR and PBS.” Moss issued an injunction halting the federal government from permanently cutting off funding to the two entities.

In a fact sheet issued along with the executive order, the White House excoriated NPR and PBS, saying the media organizations “fueled partisanship and left-wing propaganda with taxpayer dollars, which is highly inappropriate and an improper use of taxpayers’ money.” The White House cited an NPR article about “queer animals” and a PBS documentary about a transgender teenager in deriding the public media giants.

NPR and PBS sued, saying that the president’s targeting of them violated their First Amendment rights. Eleven months later, Moss sided with the outlets.