NYT: House Measure to Change Voice of America’s Mission Is Drawing Intense Debate

BBG Watch Commentary

“A bill to overhaul Voice of America has prompted an intense debate among supporters of the legislation who say it will better enable the broadcast news service to counter Russian disinformation and opponents who say it will turn the service into an American propaganda tool,” Ron Nixon reports in a New York Times article.

The article quotes Representative Ed Royce, the California Republican who is chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee and who introduced the bipartisan bill with Ranking Democratic member Representative Eliot Engel from New York. The article also quotes former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Walter Isaacson, a former chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, James K. Glassman, another former board chairman, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, a former BBG member, former Senior VOA White House Correspondent Dan Robinson, and Helle C. Dale, a senior fellow for public diplomacy at the Heritage Foundation.

READ MORE: House Measure to Change Voice of America’s Mission Is Drawing Intense Debate, Ron Nixon, The New York Times, May 20, 2014.