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I was Voice of America's director. Trump's latest pick to run the organization is dangerous.
Opinions
I was Voice of America’s director. Trump’s latest pick to run the organization is dangerous.
Opinion by Amanda Bennett
Dec. 11, 2020 at 5:07 p.m. EST
Amanda Bennett served as the 29th director of Voice of America from 2016 to 2020.
For almost 80 years, Voice of America has shown the best of America and our values to millions of people around the world. It has told people living on a diet of state propaganda things they wouldn’t otherwise know.
Without VOA, people in Iran would have heard only one side of the story when an American drone strike killed Qasem Soleimani. Without VOA, Chinese citizens would have been unaware of the full text of an address by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, only a censored version edited to remove all criticism of Beijing.
Now the Trump administration is doing its best to destroy this national treasure and the respect it has earned for itself and our country. ... Earlier this year, Trump installed Michael Pack as chief executive of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees VOA and affiliate services such as Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia. Pack promised to make the agency more effective and raise morale.
He has done none of this. ... Instead, he has sown destruction. He doled out harsh firings and suspensions for a single news segment that unfairly favored then-candidate Joe Biden and removed career civil servants who tried to moderate his actions. He silently allowed visas of foreign journalists VOA depends on for daily broadcasts in 47 languages to expire, sending them back to possible danger in the hostile countries VOA covers. His office is understood to be compiling “dossiers” — files that can be used to terminate civil servants and journalists alike, including VOA’s respected White House correspondent.
{snip}
I was Voice of America’s director. Trump’s latest pick to run the organization is dangerous.
Opinion by Amanda Bennett
Dec. 11, 2020 at 5:07 p.m. EST
Amanda Bennett served as the 29th director of Voice of America from 2016 to 2020.
For almost 80 years, Voice of America has shown the best of America and our values to millions of people around the world. It has told people living on a diet of state propaganda things they wouldn’t otherwise know.
Without VOA, people in Iran would have heard only one side of the story when an American drone strike killed Qasem Soleimani. Without VOA, Chinese citizens would have been unaware of the full text of an address by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, only a censored version edited to remove all criticism of Beijing.
Now the Trump administration is doing its best to destroy this national treasure and the respect it has earned for itself and our country. ... Earlier this year, Trump installed Michael Pack as chief executive of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees VOA and affiliate services such as Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia. Pack promised to make the agency more effective and raise morale.
He has done none of this. ... Instead, he has sown destruction. He doled out harsh firings and suspensions for a single news segment that unfairly favored then-candidate Joe Biden and removed career civil servants who tried to moderate his actions. He silently allowed visas of foreign journalists VOA depends on for daily broadcasts in 47 languages to expire, sending them back to possible danger in the hostile countries VOA covers. His office is understood to be compiling “dossiers” — files that can be used to terminate civil servants and journalists alike, including VOA’s respected White House correspondent.
{snip}
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