The Senate was on track Wednesday to pass a revised version of the 2025 Rescissions Act (HR-4) that retains language to claw back $1.1 billion in advance CPB funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027, despite opposition from Democrats and a handful of Republicans. Public broadcasting supporters continued pressing for some Republicans who voted Tuesday night to clear procedural hurdles for bringing HR-4 to the floor to vote against passing the measure. Senators were voting Wednesday afternoon on Democrats’ amendments to HR-4 after rejecting bids to jettison the CPB defunding language.

NPR’s lawsuit challenging the White House executive order against it and PBS (see 2505270047) should be dismissed because CPB hasn’t cut off funding, the Trump administration said in filings Saturday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The FCC could investigate public media stations for running ads against legislation that would rescind federal funding from NPR and PBS, said FCC Chairman Brendan Carr in a post on X Thursday night. Carr’s post came a little more than an hour after President Donald Trump said on Truth Social that he wouldn’t endorse Republican lawmakers who voted to support funding for PBS and NPR.

Senate Commerce Committee ranking member Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., emphasized Wednesday that rescinding CPB’s advance funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027 could result in “nearly 13 million Americans [being] left without access to their public media stations and the life-saving emergency alerts or information they need.”

The executive order targeting funding for NPR and PBS is illegal viewpoint discrimination and retaliation and therefore violates the Constitution, according to recent amicus filings from civil rights and journalism advocacy groups. The briefs were filed last month at the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and entered this week.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine, appeared highly skeptical during a Wednesday hearing about President Donald Trump’s proposal that Congress rescind $1.1 billion of CPB’s advance funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027 (see 2506030065). Panel member Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., also voiced concerns about parts of the CPB rescission plan but told White House OMB Director Russell Vought he wants to find a compromise. The House passed its 2025 Rescissions Act (HR-4) earlier this month with the CPB funding clawback intact, despite some Republicans’ misgivings (see 2506130025). Rounds is among a handful of Senate Republicans who have raised questions about defunding CPB (see 2506050063).

Twenty-three state attorneys general filed a joint amicus brief Monday supporting PBS and NPR lawsuits that challenge a White House executive order cutting public broadcasting funding. The brief -- from states including Colorado, Michigan, Arizona, New York and North Carolina -- argued that ending funding “would gravely harm Americans” by cutting access to emergency alerts and vital information. Rural areas and tribal communities “stand to suffer particular harms in the event public radio and television broadcasters discontinue or reduce the services they provide to those areas.” The White House’s order to cut funding usurps Congress’ authority, the filing added. “It is up to Congress, with its exclusive power of the purse, to decide whether and how to fund public media,” it said. “If the Executive Branch disagrees, the lawful course is to ask Congress to rescind appropriations, as it has now belatedly asked. But the Executive Branch’s actions challenged here, unilaterally terminating appropriations, are unlawful.”

Rep. Mark Amodei of Nevada, a Congressional Public Broadcasting Caucus co-chairman, said Thursday he joined three other Republicans in voting against the 2025 Rescissions Act (HR-4) because of its language clawing back $1.1 billion of CPB's advance funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027 (see 2506090036). The lower chamber passed HR-4 214-212, largely along party lines apart from the four GOP defectors (see 2506120084). CPB, NPR, PBS and America’s Public Television Stations urged the Senate Thursday night not to agree to the House-passed cuts.

The House voted 213-207 Wednesday afternoon on rules for floor consideration of the 2025 Rescissions Act (HR-4) that don't allow consideration of a pair of Democratic amendments to strip out language clawing back $1.1 billion of CPB's advance funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027 (see 2506090036). House Rules Committee members sparred into Tuesday night over the proposed CPB rescission before the ruling on the Democratic amendments (see 2506100069).

The House Rules Committee was still considering Tuesday whether to allow floor votes on a pair of Democratic amendments to the 2025 Rescissions Act (HR-4) that would strip out its proposed clawback of $1.1 billion of CPB’s advance funding for FY 2026 and FY 2027 (see 2506090036). Panel Republicans and Democrats sparred over CPB funding during the hearing, reflecting growing GOP interest in revoking federal support for public broadcasters over claims that their content has a predominantly pro-Democratic bias (see 2503210040). Meanwhile, Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., told us he's still undecided about supporting a CPB funding rollback once the upper chamber considers HR-4.