An executive order shuts down Voice of America and US international public broadcasters
President Donald Trump signed an executive order on 14 March 2025 reducing the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) — which oversees Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and other broadcasters — to its statutory minimum. The next day, hundreds of VOA journalists were placed on administrative leave and funding for grantee broadcasters was cancelled.
These networks broadcast in dozens of languages to audiences in countries with heavy press restrictions, such as China, Iran, Russia and North Korea. Press-freedom organizations warned that shutting them down left an information vacuum that state media in those regimes would exploit.
The decision triggered a legal battle, with lawsuits from journalists, unions and the broadcasters themselves seeking to restore their funding and operations.