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Kari Lake to Newsmax: Stop Paying for NPR, PBS

By James Morley III | Tuesday, 03 June 2025 04:57 PM EDT

Many in the Republican party have voiced their disapproval at PBS over its "Sesame Street" Pride Month message to begin June.

Kari Lake, who serves as President Donald Trump’s top advisor to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, told Newsmax on Tuesday that it's time "taxpayers stop footing the bill for this."

Lake said Trump is about focusing on what unites Americans.

"His agenda is about bringing Americans together and putting Americans first. But there's a couple of issues here. One is whether or not taxpayers should be supporting and paying for this with their tax dollars. Public broadcasting such as PBS, NPR, and really, to an extent, the agency that I oversee with Voice of America, And the president is leaning toward, 'no,' they shouldn't be funding that," Lake said during an appearance on "The Chris Salcedo Show."

Lake said, the leftist drift of the content on publicly funded media outlets is what is "most disturbing."

"And there's a bigger issue about the content that's being put out — If you're a mama bear out there and you sit your kids in front of the TV to watch Elmo, and you find out that Elmo is pushing a message of grooming to our children — it's just inappropriate content. Listen, if NPR and PBS are as amazing and great as they say they are, they should have no trouble getting public funding from people who would want to fund that," she added.