Republicans are about to win their long battle to end federal funding for public broadcasting after the Senate approved a $ 9 billion cutting package derived from the effort of the Government Efficiency Department (Doge) led by Elon Musk.
The Senate voted 51 to 48 to approve the cuts at Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), at National Public Radio (NPR) and a series of international aid. Two Republicans – Maine’s Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski from Alaska – voted against.
The result was a great victory for the White House and demonstrates that Doge’s cost cutting effort is alive, even after public quarrel between Musk and Trump, with the billionaire promising to create his own political party.
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The bill now goes to the House of Representatives, which plans to send it to President Donald Trump’s table before Friday’s deadline (17).
It was the first time in decades that the Senate approved a package of party discretionary cuts, ignoring the usual bipartisan process of appropriations. This may indicate a new era of reducing federal agencies, with Congress giving Trump’s cuts to legal certainty.
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The White House plans to send more congress -like packages to formalize doge -identified cuts. Termination packages can be approved in the Senate with only 50 votes instead of the usual 60, provided they are voted within 45 days.
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White House Budget director Russell Voyt did not disclose which agencies will be targeted in the next package. He raised the theory that any termination proposal made after August 15 would result in automatic fund cancellation if Congress does not act until September 30. These “pocket terminations” would probably be contested in court.
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Cuts in PBS and NPR
The measure would eliminate funding for Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds PBS and NPR, entities that have long been the target of conservatives for alleged liberal bias.
“They betrayed the trust of the American people,” Missouri Senator Eric Schmitt told Republican Senator Eric Schmitt. “They were ideologically captured on the left.”
Public media receive a small part of their financing from federal sources, as well as resources from individual sponsors and donors. The networks claim that smaller stations, which produce local programming, may close due to cut.
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Resistant republicans guaranteed a compromise of a single injection of $ 10 million for tribal broadcasting stations before voting.
The package would also cancel funding for international US Budget aid for International Development (USAID), as well as for smaller agencies Trump intends to close, such as the US Institute of Peace.
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Most leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, said the outward aid cuts would harm hungry children abroad and deliver the world stage to China, who has built internationally goodwill.
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“It’s simple incompetence and cruelty based on extreme ideology,” Schumer said in the Senate plenary.
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Democrats warned that Republicans are destroying the annual bipartisan process of spending by using party budget reconciliation to increase funds for agencies that favor, such as the Pentagon, while using terminations to cut democratic priorities. Schumer said these actions make it difficult to avoid closing the government on October 1.
Almost all Senate Republicans supported the Trump Administration proposal to advance with the bill after an agreement to save global health funding against Cut AIDS of $ 400 million.
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The final approval of the project occurred after a long series of amendments, in which Republicans came together to prevent democrats from blocking specific cuts, such as those of public broadcasting.
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