Voice of America staff put on leave

The Voice of America may not live up to its ambitious name for much longer.

Michael Abramowitz, the director of VOA, said in a Facebook post on Saturday that he was placed on leave, along with “virtually the entire staff” of 1,300. The announcement comes one day after President Trump signed an executive order to gut VOA’s parent agency.

Some of VOA’s local-language radio stations have stopped broadcasting news reports and switched over to music to fill the airtime, according to listeners.

Even top editors at VOA have been ordered to stop working, so employees expect the broadcaster’s worldwide news coverage to grind to a halt, according to half a dozen sources who spoke with CNN on the condition of anonymity.

“The Voice of America has been silenced, at least for now,” a veteran correspondent said.

Voice of America is part of the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which also runs networks like Radio Free Europe, Radio Free Asia, and Middle East Broadcasting Networks. Those networks are also on Trump’s chopping block, as networks’ contracts with the operators have been terminated.

While Trump allies argue that the broadcasters are bloated and outdated, advocates say that by dismantling the networks, the United States is ceding the airwaves to China and other world powers, thereby harming American interests abroad.

The United States has been funding international news and current affairs coverage intended for global audiences for decades. Both Republican and Democratic leaders have supported the attempts to promote accurate news — and democratic values — in places that are saturated by foreign propaganda.

The agency’s mission statement, codified in law, is to “inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.”

But the Trump administration has different expectations. An internal memo earlier this month said the mission is to “clearly and effectively present the policies of the Trump Administration around the world.”

Trump appointed conservative media critic Brent Bozell III to run the parent agency and tapped election-denying former TV anchor Kari Lake to run VOA. Bozell’s Senate confirmation hearing is months away, with Lake serving as a “senior adviser.” Lake signed some of the emails announcing Saturday’s cuts.

Lake tweeted that the dismantling was taking effect because “the president has issued an Executive Order titled Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy.”

Trump’s order said affected agencies should stop performing all work that is not statutorily mandated, and do the rest with as few people as possible.

The order was in line with Elon Musk’s declaration in February that government-funded international broadcasters should be shut down altogether.

“Nobody listens to them anymore,” Musk posted on X. “It’s just radical left crazy people talking to themselves while torching $1B/year of US taxpayer money.”

Advocates for the outlets strongly disagree, pointing to the broadcasters as a bulwark for democracy. Those voices include Republican lawmakers.

“Gutting Radio Free Asia and other U.S. Agency for Global Media platforms counters the principles of freedom our nation was founded on and cedes leverage to the Chinese Communist Party, North Korea and other regimes,” Rep. Young Kim, a California Republican who chairs the House Select Committee on East Asia and Pacific, told Politico last week.

It is unclear what will happen next to the USAGM’s various platforms.

In addition to the employees who were put on leave Saturday, some contractors who were working for VOA were told to hand in their badges.

Other staffers went to VOA offices on Saturday to gather their belongings because they feared being locked out altogether, sources said.

But in a recent memo, before Trump signed his order, Lake made it sound like the broadcasters will continue to exist in some fashion going forward.

“It is critical we recognize our agency is funded by hardworking American taxpayers, many of whom are struggling to make ends meet,” Lake wrote earlier this month. “That means we have an added responsibility to restore their trust while working efficiently and honestly to cover this consequential moment in our nation’s history.”

Lake said she would modernize the agency “into something the American people are willing to support.”

Abramowitz said in his Facebook post that “VOA needs thoughtful reform, and we have made progress in that regard,” but sidelining the staff means that VOA won’t be able to carry out its mission.

“That mission is especially critical today,” he wrote, “when America’s adversaries, like Iran, China, and Russia, are sinking billions of dollars into creating false narratives to discredit the United States.”

The American Foreign Service Association released a statement Saturday that it “will mount a vigorous defense of USAGM and the Foreign Service professionals whose expertise is indispensable to its mission.”