With Friday notifications, 85 percent of the workforce in the Voice of America was reduced.
Workers’ layoffs were sent to 639 Voice of America (VOA) and the United States Agency that it supervises, and effectively close the port that has provided news to countries around the world since World War II.
The notifications that were sent on Friday included employees in the Voa service in the Persian language, whose administrative leave suddenly was canceled last week to broadcast to Iran after the Israeli attack.
Three journalists working in the Persian service on Friday, who left their office for a cigarette vacation, confiscated their badges and were not allowed to return, according to an employee who fired by fire.
In total, about 1,400 people in VOA and the American Agency for Global Information, or 85 percent of the workforce, they have They have lost their jobs since MarchCarrie Lake, Trump’s chief adviser, told the agency. She said it was part of “long efforts for a long time to dismantle an indifferent bureaucracy.”
Lake said in a press statement: “For decades, American tax motivated was forced to deliberate in an agency that was implemented from defects, bias and waste,” Lake said in a press statement. “This ends now.”
Voa started broadcasting stories about American democracy for Nazi Germany, and she grew to provide news around the world in dozens of languages, often in countries without imitation of Free Press.
But President Donald Trump fought against the media on several fronts, with the complaint that many of what they produce are biased against conservatives. It includes a proposal to close federal financing to Pbs and NPRAnd it is currently before Congress.
The “death” of the independent press
Most Voa employees have been on an administrative vacation since March 15, when broadcasting and social media were often silent. Three Voa employees who are fighting the dismantling of the administration of VOA were in court among those who received the hairstyles of workers on Friday.
“It shows the death of 83 years of independent press that supports the ideals of democracy and freedom all over the world,” prosecutors Jessica Geret, Kate Naber, Patseis and Dakusura said in a statement.
The employee was in the Persian language, which occurred provided that his identity was not disclosed due to the ongoing legal case, in the office on Friday when colleagues were prevented from re -entering. The person was afraid to leave for the same reason – although the authorities said that their work had stopped – until it was noticeable.
Steve Hermann, the chief national correspondent of VOA who was in the process of retirement to take over at the University of Mississippi, described the “act of demobilization” from the historical act with the United States government that has completed its most effective energy weapons.
It is not clear, if anything, will replace VOA programming all over the world. The American news network that supports Trump has offered the use of a signal.
Although the plaintiffs in the case called on Congress to continue supporting VOA, Hermann said he was not optimistic that he would survive, even if a democratic president and Congress take over. For one reason, every day outside the air is another day for viewers and readers to reach another habit to get the news.
Hermann said: “I think the destruction is permanent, because we do not see any indicator in the coming fiscal year that Congress will gather to finance VOA,” Hermann said.
By the time when another managing the authority that sympathizes more with the port takes over, “I am afraid that VOA will be forgotten,” he said.
https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/AP25112727889108-1745359367.jpg?resize=1200%2C675
Source link