Judge invalidates Trump executive order, but Congress also cut off all funding.
A federal judge ruled that Trump’s executive order defunding NPR and PBS violated the First Amendment and issued a permanent injunction stating that executive branch agencies cannot enforce it.
The Trump order’s “instruction that all federal agencies stop funding NPR and PBS constitutes a penalty for engaging in speech disfavored by the President and cannot be lawfully implemented by any executive department or agency,” Judge Randolph Moss, an Obama appointee in US District Court for the District of Columbia, ruled yesterday.
The ruling against Trump in the case filed by NPR, PBS, and several stations may not have much practical impact. Trump’s May 2025 executive order was followed by Congress rescinding the entire Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) budget of $1.1 billion for fiscal years 2026 and 2027.
It’s also important to fight a bunch of battles that don’t really matter to you. Trump does not give a flying fuck about PBS or the arts or wasting federal spending. He just knows his opponents do care, and will have to spend bandwidth fighting him on it. If and when he loses, he will use it to paint the picture of moderation, and insist things are unfair to him to lose every time.