USAGM Watch Commentary
The devastating fires in Los Angeles have been the number one news story on almost every major U.S. and international news website, including the New York Times and the BBC, but not on the Voice of America (VOA) English news homepage, where on Thursday evening and early Friday it remained buried at the end of the homepage under the “All About America” category. The Voice of America had the LA fires story as number 17 in the lineup. It is hardly visible on the VOA English News homepage below multiple, much less topical and less significant news. On the Voice of America U.S. News page, the Los Angeles fires story was number 10 in the lineup.
Except for the Voice of America English newsroom, nearly all other international news media outlets lead with the Los Angeles fires story, at least in their international news sections, if not at the top of their homepages.
This commentary has been updated with new information on January 10, 2025.
While the Voice of America has downplayed the Los Angeles fires story and ignored the criticism of the Los Angeles Democratic mayor, the BBC News website leads with the story. The BBC News homepage has multiple reports on the various angles of the response to the natural disaster.
The Voice of America English News website had one report on the criticism of the Biden administration’s handling of the Los Angeles fires, but it was not written by VOA. It is an Agence France Press report posted by VOA editors. The VOA failed to provide its own report on the controversy that meets the requirements of the VOA Charter.
Even on the Voice of America U.S. News page, the Los Angeles fires story was number 10 in the lineup late Thursday evening and early Friday.
The Voice of America VOA English News website also ignored widespread bipartisan criticism of Los Angeles Democratic Mayor Karen Bass for leaving the city during a potential fire emergency to attend the inauguration of Ghana’s new president. She was part of a delegation sent by President Biden to Ghana and did not return to Los Angeles until Wednesday afternoon.
Critics of the Voice of America and the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) have noted that the VOA English newsroom has hardly any journalists registered as Republicans or independents. Those very few who are left in these two categories have been telling USAGM Watch that they are afraid to criticize other VOA newsroom reporters, editors, and managers because they said they fear being “canceled” or ostracized by their colleagues. They believe that speaking out against their editors or the VOA and USAGM leadership would damage their chances for promotions and better assignments.
VOA English Newsroom Protecting the Biden Administration from Criticism
As observed by several former Voice of America journalist-broadcasters, editors, and government media managers with decades of international and domestic news reporting experience, the VOA news report, initially released by the VOA Central English Newsroom on June 27, 2024, after the first presidential debate, said nothing about President Biden’s feeble performance. For several hours, the Voice of America was silent in its main online report on the debate on this new major news, even though Biden’s stumble immediately became the top story for both liberal and conservative media in the U.S. and abroad. VOA, the flagship international broadcaster of the federally-funded U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), did not update its main news report with information about Biden’s poor debate handling until much later.
When, much later, the VOA English newsroom did update the Biden-Trump debate story with information about President Biden’s poor performance, editors buried the update in the middle of the online text. They did not change the headline to reflect the significance of Biden’s incoherent responses to some of the questions.
Former VOA journalists also observed that in recent years, the VOA newsroom would usually first try to ignore news unfavorable to the Obama and Biden administrations, the Democratic Party politicians, or Biden’s appointees and their managers at USAGM. However, when it becomes evident that a news story is too big to ignore, the VOA newsroom would sometimes post a wire service report. Former VOA broadcasters think that this is probably because no VOA reporter in the now highly politicized and partisan VOA Central English Newsroom wants to be the first to put his or her name to a negative news story about Democrats and liberal causes. When a story becomes huge and widely reported by such media outlets as the Washington Post and the New York Times, VOA newsroom reporters who are strongly pro-Biden sometimes initiate news reports on such negative developments for the Biden administration but often many hours or days later.
Efforts to Reform VOA English Newsroom
The new Voice of America Director, Michael Abramowitz, is reported to be aware of the problem posed by highly partisan VOA English newsroom managers, editors, and reporters and has taken some actions to make VOA news reporting in English more timely and less biased but little progress has been made.
President-elect Trump has chosen Kari Lake, an American political figure and former television news anchor, as the next Director of the Voice of America (VOA). However, before assuming this position, under the current law, she must first be approved by a majority vote of the bipartisan International Broadcasting Advisory Board (IBAB).
Former Voice of America reporters who are critical of the VOA newsroom management said that Kari Lake, if approved by the International Broadcasting Advisory Board (IBAB), must maintain public neutrality on contentious political matters while restoring the Voice of America’s editorial independence and professional ethics. She faces a significant challenge in correcting ideological bias and management issues. They stress that she must uphold the VOA Charter, which is U.S. law. They noted that Michael Abramowitz, the recently appointed VOA director who successfully headed the human rights NGO Freedom House, has at least brought some measure of personal competence back to VOA.
However, critics have not noticed any major changes at the VOA English newsroom and are upset over the recently approved Best Practices guide. They point out that In the section on terrorism, the guide retains a lenient approach to describing terrorists. Some VOA managers, editors, and reporters still refuse to call Hamas terrorists. They prefer calling Hamas terrorists who murdered defenseless civilians “militants” or “fighters.”
VOA Was Late in Updating News of The New Orleans Attack and Late in Calling It an Act of Terrorism
Critics also noted that the VOA English website had this headline: “AP: Law enforcement officials say suspect in New Orleans crash is dead” halfway down the homepage until at least 11 AM on New Year’s Day — 8 hours after the terrorist attack — with no reference at all to this being a terror attack that actually killed innocent people.
Recent Media Commentaries and Reports on VOA and USAGM
Kari Lake will face a harrowing task in fixing a very broken VOA | OPINION | THE HILL | December 22, 2024
She must not allow activist journalists favoring radical ideologies to use VOA to interfere in U.S. domestic politics or to repeat foreign propaganda without challenge, as VOA has done in recent years. To set an example, Lake must remain publicly neutral on controversial domestic political issues. Her job is not to be the president’s spokesperson but to restore VOA’s editorial independence and adherence to the highest professional standards and ethics of journalism.
Kari Lake Says She Will Not Politicize VOA Like the Current Administration
In a recent interview with CBS News, Kari Lake said she has no intention of turning Voice of America into “Trump TV.”
