☀️ Happy Thursday! The Briefing is your guide to the world of news and information. Sign up here!
In today’s email:
- Featured story: NPR and PBS leaders testify in Congress amid efforts to cut broadcasters’ federal funding
- In other news: The Atlantic releases Signal chat where government officials discussed plans for military attack
- Looking ahead: Americans’ opinions on TikTok ban ahead of April 5 deadline
- Chart of the week: Democrats are more trusting than Republicans of NPR and PBS as sources of news
🔥 Featured story
At a hearing on Wednesday organized by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the chair of the House subcommittee linked to the Trump administration’s government efficiency efforts, congressional Republicans criticized PBS and NPR over what’s been perceived as institutional bias. While the leaders of the organizations defended their programming, they also acknowledged past missteps in reporting.
Congressional Republicans have sought to cut back public media’s federal funding for decades, but the hearing may represent a more serious effort. Lawmakers in both the House and the Senate have introduced legislation that would ban federal funding for public broadcasters.
In a new Pew Research Center survey, about a quarter of U.S. adults (24%) say Congress should remove federal funding from NPR and PBS. A larger share (43%) say NPR and PBS should continue to receive funding from the federal government, while 33% say they are not sure.
📌 In other news
- The Atlantic releases Signal chat after editor was added to Trump administration group discussing plans for military attack
- A look at the ethical questions journalists face when in Jeffrey Goldberg’s position
- Supreme Court declines to hear challenge to New York Times v. Sullivan
- Lawmakers again trying to repeal Section 230, which shields tech from liability for internet speech
- A look at how the Trump administration is using false information to pursue policy goals
- How small news outlets are challenging state-funded media as they cover protests in Turkey
- Judge freezes Trump administration cuts to U.S. Agency for Global Media
- An Italian newspaper experimented with letting AI take over
📅 Looking ahead
The new April 5 deadline is approaching for TikTok to be sold or face a nationwide ban, already extended from the original Jan. 19 date. On Monday, Democratic senators urged an additional extension to October. Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance is reportedly facilitating possible deals that would buy out Chinese investors in the app, where a growing share of Americans get news.
Public support for a TikTok ban now stands at 34% among U.S. adults, down from 50% in March 2023, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. A similar share of Americans (32%) oppose a ban, while another 33% say they are not sure.
The share of Americans who perceive TikTok as a national security threat has also dipped – from 59% in May 2023 to 49% now.
📊 Chart of the week
Our chart this week looks at partisans’ trust in NPR and PBS. According to a new Center survey, Democrats are more likely than Republicans to trust NPR and PBS as sources of news. Nearly half of Democrats (47%) say they trust NPR as a source of news, compared with 12% of Republicans. The same pattern applies to PBS, with 59% of Democrats and 23% of Republicans trusting the outlet. For both public broadcasters, Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to say they distrust the outlets.
👋 That’s all for this week.
The Briefing is compiled by Pew Research Center staff, including Naomi Forman-Katz, Jacob Liedke, Christopher St. Aubin, Luxuan Wang and Emily Tomasik. It is edited by Michael Lipka and copy edited by Anna Jackson.
Do you like this newsletter? Email us at journalism@pewresearch.org or fill out this two-question survey to tell us what you think.
