You must cease all work immediately and are not permitted to access any agency buildings or systems
The Trump administration has made it obvious that it intends to eliminate US-funded media outlets, including Voice of America, through a series of mass layoffs that began on Sunday.
A day after everyone was placed on leave, contractual workers were informed via email that they were laid off at the end of March.
Several workers who spoke with AFP verified that the email informed contractors, “You must cease all work immediately and are not permitted to access any agency buildings or systems.”
The majority of VOA’s employees work as contractors, and this is especially true in the non-English language services. However, recent figures were not currently unavailable. Contractors who are not citizens of the United States may rely on the visas that their jobs provide to remain in the country after they are no longer needed.
The majority of VOA full-time employees, who enjoy greater legal rights, were handed non-working orders and placed on administrative leave instead of being fired straight away.
Since its inception during World War II, Voice of America has been broadcasting in 49 different languages all over the world with the goal of reaching countries that do not have freedom of the press.
According to Liam Scott, a reporter for the Voice of America who covers issues related to press freedom and disinformation, he was informed that he also reported that he was being fired as of March 31 from his position.
On X, he wrote, “The Trump administration’s destruction of VOA and sister outlets are part of its efforts to dismantle the government more broadly — but it’s also part of the administration’s broader assault on press freedom and the media.
“I’ve covered press freedom for a long time, and I’ve never seen something like what’s happened in the US over the past couple of months.”
The US Agency for Global Media, the parent company of VOA, was one of the many federal agencies that Trump has recently targeted in an executive order he issued on Friday.
During the fiscal year of 2023, the agency employed 3,384 people. Its budget request for the current fiscal year was $950 million.
During the Cold War, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty was created to reach the former Soviet bloc. The massive cuts also halted Radio Free Asia, which had been set up to offer reporting to Asia’s most repressive nations like North Korea, China, and others.
Radio Farda, an Iranian-language station that the Iranian government has barred, and Alhurra, an Arabic-language network that was launched following the Iraq invasion in response to harsh criticism from Al-Jazeera in Qatar, are among the other US-funded outlets that are being severely curtailed.
In a statement released on Saturday, the White House said that “taxpayers are no longer on the hook for radical propaganda,” an accusation that was seldom made against the long-established VOA, which had previously sought to combat communism, prior to Trump’s presidency.
Despite VOA’s firewall protecting its editorial independence, Trump continues to criticise media coverage of him and has questioned the value of supporting the organisation.
In order to fund tax cuts, Trump has pledged to significantly shrink the government, following the suggestion of tech entrepreneur Elon Musk.
The majority of foreign development assistance has already been halted by his administration, and they are now moving to gut the Education Department.
The actions are being taken in response to the heavy investment in state media by Russia and China to counter Western narratives; China, in particular, frequently provides free programming to developing world outlets.
“The monopoly of information held by some traditional Western media is being shattered,” the editorial board of China’s state-run Global Times wrote in response to VOA’s axing.
“As more Americans begin to break through their information cocoons and see a real world and a multidimensional China, the demonizing narratives propagated by VOA will ultimately become a laughingstock of the times.”