Radio Free Asia (RFA) is laying off approximately 90% of its workforce and discontinuing several language services following funding cuts imposed by the Trump administration. RFA's CEO, Bay Fang, described the situation as unconscionable, lacking support from the U.S. Agency for Global Media. Established to promote democratic values, RFA has served around 60 million listeners in various languages since 1996. The funding reductions threaten their critical reporting on authoritarian regimes, particularly highlighted by their recent investigations into China's Uyghur policies and ongoing civil unrest in Myanmar.
We are in an unconscionable situation," Bay Fang, RFA's president and CEO, said in a statement. "Because we can no longer rely on [the U.S. Agency for Global Media] to disburse our funds as Congress intended, we will have to begin mass layoffs and let entire language services go dark in the next week."
This work is more than a job for me and so many of the people who are part of RFA. They are immensely proud to be part of this team and see it as their life's work to shine a light into the dark corners of the countries we cover," Fang told NPR on Friday.
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