10 Instances Showing NPR Shouldn’t Receive More Taxpayer Funding

In a congressional subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, National Public Radio CEO Katherine Maher admitted the outfit’s blackout of the Hunter Biden laptop story was a mistake, acknowledged that NPR’s alleged 87-to-zero ratio of Democrats to Republicans in editorial positions is a “concern,” and stumbled through a defense of her publicly expressed views like “America is addicted to white supremacy” and calling the First Amendment “the number one challenge” to suppressing information.

As Republican members of Congress pointed out, one of NPR’s most infamous displays of corruption was its refusal to cover the Biden family scandal sourced to Hunter Biden’s laptop in the lead-up to the 2020 election.

“We don’t want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don’t want to waste the listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are just pure distractions,” NPR Managing Editor for News Terence Samuel said in a statement explaining the blackout.

Wednesday’s hearing provided more than enough evidence that the outfit’s generous federal subsidies should be next on DOGE’s chopping block. But in case the Trump administration needs a few more reasons, here are 10 other times NPR proved its propaganda doesn’t deserve another taxpayer dime.

1. SCOTUS Maskgate

In January 2022, NPR’s Nina Totenberg wrote a fake story accusing Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch of forcing his colleague Justice Sonia Sotomayor into telework because he refused to wear a mask “despite [her] COVID worries.”

The following day, the justices released a joint statement debunking the invented drama, calling Totenberg’s story “false.”

“Reporting that Justice Sotomayor asked Justice Gorsuch to wear a mask surprised us. It is false,” they wrote. “While we may sometimes disagree about the law, we are warm colleagues and friends.”

2. ‘Babies Are Not Babies Until They Are Born’

In May 2019, NPR publicly released a “reminder” of its terminology guidance to reporters for their abortion coverage. This “guidance” from NPR editor Joe Neel showed just how committed the outfit is to denying reality to suit its political ends:

“The term ‘unborn’ implies that there is a baby inside a pregnant woman, not a fetus. Babies are not babies until they are born. They’re fetuses. Incorrectly calling a fetus a ‘baby’ or ‘the unborn’ is part of the strategy used by antiabortion groups to shift language/legality/public opinion.”

3. Broadcasting an Abortion

In November 2022, NPR made the baffling decision to air audio of a child being vacuumed out of his mother’s womb by an abortionist. While the audio unintentionally drew attention to the horrors of the procedure, that clearly wasn’t the broadcaster’s intent, judging by the NPR narrator’s calm appraisal.

“[T]he lights are dimmed, there’s soothing music,” she says in the clip, with the sound of an 11-week-old unborn baby being aborted in the background. “It actually feels a lot like a childbirth — the medical gown, your bare legs in stirrups, and a person next to you saying, ‘You can do this.’”

4. Tear Gas Hoax

In June 2020, NPR — along with nearly every major legacy news outlet — falsely claimed demonstrators outside the White House were tear-gassed by U.S. Park Police.

“Park Police Tear Gas Peaceful Protesters To Clear Way For Trump Church Photo-Op,” an NPR headline read, while a tweet from NPR Politics claimed, “Police in Washington, D.C. used tear gas and rubber bullets on peaceful protesters to clear them away from St. John’s Church, which suffered a small fire.”

The protesters NPR described as “peaceful” were actually “throwing projectiles including bricks, frozen water bottles and caustic liquids,” according to acting Park Police Chief Gregory T. Monahan. Nor had Park Police or any “assisting law enforcement” used tear gas, Monahan confirmed. Rather, police had used smoke canisters, which lack the irritant used in tear gas.

As for the “small fire” at St. John’s Church, that was an interesting way to describe an act of apparent arson that left the church’s nursery gutted.

5. ‘In Defense of Looting’

That same summer, NPR assistant editor Natalie Escobar used her position at the government-funded outlet to promote a book titled “In Defense of Looting.” Author Vicky Osterweil argues “that looting is a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society,” as Escobar summarized.

6. A Baby’s Heartbeat=‘Sounds From the Fetus’

In 2016, after Ohio Gov. John Kasich vetoed a bill that would have restricted abortion after a baby’s heartbeat is detectable around the six-week mark, NPR described the heartbeat bill as a “bill tied to sounds from the fetus.”

The bizarre, dehumanizing language has since disappeared from the story.

7. Lies about Don Jr.’s Senate Testimony

When the Senate Judiciary Committee grilled Donald Trump Jr. in 2017 about the Trump Organization’s past discussions of real estate developments in Russia, NPR falsely portrayed Trump Jr.’s testimony as claiming the Trump Organization’s real estate negotiations had ended in 2014, an account which NPR said “contrasts with” attorney Michael Cohen’s admission that the negotiations continued into 2016.

As Federalist Editor-in-Chief Mollie Hemingway pointed out at the time, Trump Jr. had explicitly told senators the negotiations did continue into “late 2015 or 2016,” matching with Cohen’s testimony. The section of his testimony that NPR cited was actually in response to a completely different question, in which Trump Jr. said negotiations with a different party (not Cohen) had ended in 2014. NPR was forced to correct its story.

8. ‘Verbal Slips Happen’

After Special Counsel Robert Hur declined to criminally charge Biden for retaining classified documents because of the president’s “poor memory,” NPR dismissed Americans’ concerns about the president’s obvious senility, insisting “verbal slips happen.” The outlet tried to convince readers Biden’s obvious lack of mental wherewithal was no different than the occasional misspoken word from Trump, before pivoting to talk about “why so many see Trump as a threat to democracy.”

That sure aged well!

9. Assault Victim or ‘Right-Wing Extremist’?

After armed assailants attacked a Kentucky woman at gunpoint in 2020, NPR used a photo of the woman fleeing her attackers in her car as the featured image in a story about “Right-wing extremists … turning cars into weapons.” The dishonest juxtaposition made it look like the crime victim was using her car to run over innocent bystanders, rather than fleeing from their attacks.

NPR eventually replaced the photo.

10. Country Music a ‘Symbol of Racism’

Your tax dollars don’t just fund lies from NPR, they also fund super-serious journalism like podcast investigations linking the country music genre to racism. In August 2023, NPR’s Britany Luse hosted an episode titled “How racism became a marketing tool for country music.”

“[I]s racism what it takes for country music to go number one?” she narrated. “I wanted to know how country music became this symbol of racism and why country music fans are flocking to stars … who are peddling racist rhetoric today. ”

Elle Purnell is the elections editor at The Federalist. Her work has been featured by Fox Business, RealClearPolitics, the Tampa Bay Times, and the Independent Women’s Forum. She received her B.A. in government from Patrick Henry College with a minor in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @_ellepurnell.