Senate Appropriations Advances FY26 Funding Bill Without CPB Money
The Senate Appropriations Committee voted 25-3 Thursday to advance the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Subcommittee’s FY 2026 funding bill without any CPB allotment. The move underscored stakeholders’ consensus that it will be very difficult for public broadcasting advocates to restore that funding after Congress narrowly agreed in mid-July to claw back all $1.1 billion of CPB’s advance money for FY26 and FY27 via the 2025 Rescissions Act (see 2507280050). Most Senate Appropriations Democrats voted for the FY26 measure, but LHHS ranking member Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and other party-affiliated members indicated that they haven’t given up on bringing CPB funding back before FY25 ends Oct. 1.
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Senate Appropriations Vice Chair Patty Murray of Washington led other Democrats -- as well as Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska -- in voicing disappointment that the LHHS bill doesn’t include any CPB funding. President Donald Trump’s FY26 budget request proposed allocating CPB $30 million for FY26 to allow an orderly windup (see 2506020056). Murray and others also lambasted Republicans for agreeing to roll back CPB’s already-allocated money. “It is a shameful reality, and now communities across the country will suffer the consequences as over 1,500 stations lose critical funding,” she said. “I really hope that Republicans will join us to restore this funding down the line, and I want you to know I'm going to keep pushing to do that.”
Baldwin offered and then immediately withdrew an amendment that would have given CPB $559 million for FY26, including $60 million for public broadcasting infrastructure upgrades. She decided to “not ask for a vote [on the amendment] because I believe that there is a path forward to fix this [defunding] before there are devastating consequences for public radio and television stations across the country.” Baldwin noted that “no one raised a concern” about CPB during the FY24 and FY25 funding cycles, when she was LHHS chair, and Senate Appropriations cleared CPB’s advance funding “with overwhelming majorities" both times (see 2403210067 and 2408010059).
“Suddenly this became such an urgent problem that had to be addressed immediately, because [Trump] said so,” Baldwin said. “This cut to local public radio will fall hardest on those in rural areas,” where “stations will close" and residents will lose access. “That will mean that when there are natural disasters and the only signal being broadcast to impacted areas is over public broadcasting, individuals in those areas will not get those alerts,” she said. “It will mean that children will have less access to quality educational programming.”
Defunding 'Transition'
Senate Appropriations LHHS Chair Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., who backed the CPB clawback, emphasized that “we litigated [this issue] two weeks ago” when the upper chamber approved the Rescissions Act (see 2507170045). “Adopting [Baldwin’s] amendment would have been contrary to what we have already voted on,” Capito said. She countered that the Federal Emergency Management Agency-administered Integrated Public Alert Warning System "will not be impacted," as public broadcasting advocates claim, "which means our rural communities will still receive those public emergency alerts and more warnings.”
Murkowski, one of two Senate Republicans who voted against the Rescissions Act, said she plans to visit Alaska’s public broadcasting stations during Congress’ August recess to better determine how the CPB defunding will affect them. “The budgets of almost half of the radio stations in Alaska depend 50% or more on CPB funding, [and] 20 of the 26 stations depend at least 30% on” that money, she said. “Some of our stations are going to be forced to close this year. Some can weather the storm for maybe a year or so. They've got some reserves, but some pretty drastic changes to staffing and programming” are likely. “Some are in the process of figuring out how to move forward, [but] they don't have the ability to fundraise in their communities,” Murkowski said.
CPB CEO Patricia Harrison said Senate Appropriations’ “decision to provide no funding to CPB [in FY26] will cause irreparable harm, especially to small and rural public media stations.” The entity “will continue serving as a responsible financial steward of federal funding, to help local stations prepare for and adjust to the loss of federal support,” she said. “Our focus remains on supporting them through this transition and helping them navigate the challenges ahead.”
America's Public Television Stations “are deeply disappointed” by the Senate Appropriations vote, said CEO Kate Riley. “This bill was an opportunity to acknowledge the dire situation that local stations are in and reverse their devastating fate. Instead, [the committee] turned a blind eye to local public media stations and the communities that rely on them for critical services.” APTS members remain “hopeful that as the appropriations process moves forward Members of Congress will respect the clear will of the American people and restore essential federal funding for local” broadcasters, she said.