The lawsuit highlights that Congress allocated $535 million in general funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) for the fiscal years 2025,2026,and 2027. According to the suit, “NPR is funded primarily through sponsorships, donations from individuals and private entities, membership and licensing fees from local public radio stations, direct funding from the Corporation, and direct funding from other government grants, including grants awarded by the NEA.”

Funding Shortfall Deemed “Catastrophic”

According to court documents, “NPR said the loss of federal funding and fees from stations that would otherwise acquire programming from NPR ‘would be catastrophic’ to the organization.” The organization estimates that about 31 percent of its operating revenue comes from membership and licensing fees from local stations, “and additional millions of dollars from CPB to support NPR’s coverage of particular issue areas, such as the ongoing war in ukraine.”

“NPR said the loss of federal funding and fees from stations that would otherwise acquire programming from NPR ‘would be catastrophic’ to the organization.”

The lawsuit warns that the potential loss of funding could force “NPR to shutter or downsize collaborative newsrooms and rural reporting initiatives,” and “eliminate or scale back critical national and international coverage that serves the entire public radio system and is not replicable at scale on the local level.”

The NEA reportedly terminated a grant award to NPR shortly after the Executive order was issued.”This termination confirms that NEA is complying with the Order and has rendered NPR ineligible to apply for grants going forward,” the lawsuit states.

NPR’s legal challenge also argues that the executive order “purports to require the Corporation to prohibit local stations from using CPB grants to acquire NPR’s programming, notwithstanding a statutory requirement that stations must use ‘restricted’ funds to acquire or produce programming that is distributed nationally and serves the needs of national audiences.”

The lawsuit further claims that local stations would be compelled “to redirect those funds to acquire different national programming-in contravention of their own editorial choices-and to take additional, non-federal funds out of their budgets to continue acquiring NPR’s programming.”