Judge says Voice of America staffers can go back to work
The government-funded broadcaster has been locked in a court battle to stay on the airwaves.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth issued a preliminary injunction halting part of President Donald Trump’s executive order aimed at dismantling the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), the independent agency tasked with running Voice of America. More than 1,200 federal employees and contractors from Voice of America — including about 1,000 journalists — were placed on administrative leave as a result of the order.
Though Voice of America has stopped broadcasting for the first time since its founding, its employees have fought back in federal court. The government now faces multiple lawsuits including from Voice of America Director Michael Abramowitz, a former longtime reporter at The Washington Post, and White House bureau chief Patsy Widakuswara.
Lamberth found that the government did not act in a careful or considered way in shutting down the agency. “Not only is there an absence of ‘reasoned analysis’ from the defendants,” he wrote in the opinion. “There is an absence of any analysis whatsoever. … It is hard to fathom a more straightforward display of arbitrary and capricious actions than the Defendants’ actions here.”
He ordered that the government must take steps to restore employees and contractors to their original status before the executive order, restore the USAGM grants for Radio Free Asia and Middle East Broadcasting Networks, and restore VOA programming so the agency can fulfill its statutory mandate.
more:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2025/04/22/voice-of-america-voa-ruling-employees-return/
Do something positive.
| 
