Senior presidential adviser Kari Lake appears to have resolved any doubts about what she wants to do with the Voice of America.
Lake seeks for it to look and sound a lot like the far-right One America News Network: on Tuesday night she announced that she had struck a deal to serve up the pro-Trump outlet's news reports for Voice of America's foreign audiences, at no taxpayer cost.
"I can ensure our outlets have reliable and credible options as they work to craft their reporting and news programs," Lake wrote on social media posts on Elon Musk's X and on Truth Social. "And every day I look for ways to save American taxpayers money. Bringing in OAN as a video/news source does both." OAN President Charles Herring did not immediately reply to NPR's message seeking confirmation, but he did retweet Lake's post.
The reaction from agency and network veterans was swift and indignant.
'A mockery of the agency's history'
"Kari Lake providing One America News Network to our global audiences makes a mockery of the agency's history of independent non-partisan journalism," former U.S. Agency for Global Media Chief Financial Officer Grant Turner tells NPR.
Since World War II, the Voice of America has provided news coverage and cultural programming to lands across the globe without access to a free press, serving an audience that has grown to more than 360 million people weekly. Its charge - established by Congress - is to incorporate criticism of the government's official line to convey the news in its complexity but also to model what a pluralistic democracy looks like.
Since March, however, the Voice of America has been stilled, on the order of Trump and Lake. Her announcement called the parent agency "a giant rot and burden to the American taxpayer."
Lake put nearly the entire workforce on indefinite leave. Under the current status of pending litigation filed by a coalition of Voice of America journalists, agency employees, unions and press advocacy groups, the U.S. Agency for Global Media must run programs on Voice of America once again. The addition of OAN might help Lake accomplish that without reconstituting the network as it was.
According to three Voice of America staffers who remain on forced leave, the agency asked a small number of journalists back on Tuesday. At the same time, contractors are beginning to receive termination notices. (The staffers spoke on condition they not be named, citing concerns of repercussions given the current climate at the agency.)
Lake has not responded to NPR's requests for comment.
Earlier this year, the White House canceled Voice of America's contracts with major news services, including The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse, outlets that the broadcaster used to supplement its reporting.
OAN's resolute support of Trump led to legal trouble
OAN has distinguished itself by its resolute support of President Trump — even as he insisted falsely that he had been cheated of re-election in 2020.
OAN reached settlements to resolve separate defamation lawsuits filed by the voting software company Smartmatic, a former executive at Dominion Voting Systems, and two Georgia election workers over disproven claims that they had helped rig the 2020 presidential elections for Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
Trump aides have welcomed OAN reporters to the White House and called upon them during press briefings while media mainstays have had their access curtailed at the White House and Pentagon; Trump's first pick for U.S. attorney general, Matt Gaetz, became a host for the network after his planned nomination collapsed.
In her social media posts, Lake acknowledged she does not have the authority to make editorial choices for the networks. However, she said the addition of OAN was suggested by someone at the Office of Cuba Broadcasting. The Cuba bureau's director is herself on indefinite leave.
Lake is a former local TV news anchor in Phoenix turned two-time unsuccessful pro-Trump candidate for state-wide office in Arizona. Like OAN, she has promoted Trump's lies about election fraud and and has made groundless claims about her races as well.
Current and former U.S. Agency for Global Media and Voice of America staffers said OAN programming would not fulfill the network's mission.
"I don't think this complies with our statutory mandate and I don't think audiences will take to it," says Turner, who served as the agency's acting CEO under Trump from October 2019 to June 2020. "The truth has a certain feel and audiences can sense that."
"Congress mandated VOA to report reliable and authoritative news, not outsource its journalism to outlets aligned with the president's agenda," Voice of America White House bureau chief Patsy Widakuswara and press freedom editor Jessica Jerreat said in a joint statement shared with NPR.
'We will continue fighting'
The two journalists, both currently on indefinite leave, are among a group of staffers who have sued Lake and the Trump administration, alleging that their actions toward Voice of America broke the law and violated constitutional free press protections. They are currently appealing an adverse decision by an appellate panel to the full roster of federal appellate judges for the D.C. circuit, standing among a workforce whipsawed by a series of contradictory announcements and judicial rulings.
"VOA already has talented and professional journalists ready to tell America's story in line with the VOA Charter, but we are blocked from our own newsroom," Widakuswara and Jerreat said. "That is why we will continue fighting for our rights in court."
For the Voice of America and its sister networks, the one constant of the restoration of Trump to the White House has been chaos.
At the behest of an executive order in mid-March, Lake silenced its broadcasts, froze its website in time and put nearly everyone at the U.S. Agency for Global Media and the network on indefinite leave. She also stopped paying Voice of America's sister networks that are privately incorporated but rely on federal support: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia, and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks.
"Kari Lake, President Trump's senior adviser, unlawfully terminated our grant agreement," said Jeffrey Gedmin, the president and chief executive of the Middle East Broadcasting Networks. "We've been starved of resources ever since, forced to terminate more than 90 percent of our staff. The American taxpayer, MBN's Congressionally mandated mission, and pro-American audiences are all big losers in this wasteful, reckless, and foolish power game."
Radio Free Asia and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty have been forced to lay off most of their staffs too. All the networks are enmeshed in related lawsuits against Lake and the White House.
Ten journalists who report for the networks are imprisoned across the globe - their access to legal and security assistance imperiled, according to a March report in the Columbia Journalism Review by Liam Scott. Scott previously covered press freedom for Voice of America.
Lake celebrates an appellate panel's ruling
After a federal judge ruled that she had to reverse course last week, Lake appeared on Newsmax TV to praise Trump's first 100 days and blasted court rulings against his administration. "We've got district court judges who think they have more power than the president of the United States," Lake said.
On Friday, Lake sent out a note to staffers saying they will receive guidance on how the agency will modernize and meet its mission. "We look forward to working with you all," Lake summed up.
Just a day later, a three-judge appellate court panel ruled that the judge had overstepped, finding that the dispute over Voice of America should be mediated through labor and employment administrative processes before they are taken to the courts.
Both judges in the majority were appointed by Trump in his first term; the lone dissenter, appointed by President Barack Obama, argued that Trump was exceeding his authority in seeking to dismantle Voice of America, given Congressional support and funding for its activities.
"The government cannot seriously contend on this posture that the relevant statutes—or more foundationally the constitutional separation of powers—permit the President to wholly scupper Voice of America and its affiliated Networks," Judge Cornellia Pillard wrote in dissent.
The plaintiffs are appealing that ruling.
But Lake has been celebrating. "BIG WIN," she tweeted that afternoon. "Huge Victory."
The government had not fought the part of the initial ruling requiring that Voice of America get back on the air.
With Tuesday night's announcement, Lake showed what she'd like that to look like.
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