Without a friendly mediasphere, what will happen to Democrats?
“Congress approves Trump’s $9 billion cut to public broadcasting and foreign aid,” Kevin Freking and Mary Clare Jalonick reported gloomily for the Associated Press on July 18, 2025.
“The vote marked the first time in decades that a president has successfully submitted such a rescissions request to Congress, and the White House suggested it won’t be the last,” they warned.
“The cancellation of $1.1 billion for the CPB represents the full amount it is due to receive during the next two budget years,” explained Freking and Jalonick.
“The White House says the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense,” they added, noting that “Democrats were unsuccessful in restoring the funding in the Senate.”
While conservative media outlets giddily took a victory lap — none of them being in receipt of taxpayer largesse in any case — the loss of taxpayer money for NPR and PBS wasn’t the only bad news for Democrats this week.
“Stephen Colbert’s ‘Late Show’ run will come to an end next year as CBS cancels franchise,” Tim Stelloh and Steve Kopack revealed for NBC News on July 17, 2025. “The decision ‘is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount,’ the network said.”
“‘We consider Stephen Colbert irreplaceable and will retire ‘THE LATE SHOW’ franchise at that time,’ CBS executives said in a joint statement,” relayed NBC. “We are proud that Stephen called CBS home. He and the broadcast will be remembered in the pantheon of greats that graced late night television.”
“This is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night,” claimed CBC in a statement. “It is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount.”
Not everyone was convinced of the network’s reasoning, however.
“Is Colbert’s Ouster Really Just a ‘Financial Decision’?” wondered David A. Graham for The Atlantic on July 17, 2025. “This evening, the network announced plans to end The Late Show With Stephen Colbert when the host’s contract ends next May.”
“CBS’s owners have made a series of decisions capitulating to President Donald Trump, and the surprise choice to allow Colbert — a consistent, prominent Trump critic — to walk seems like part of that pattern,” mused Graham. “Since the election, CBS has seemed eager to please Trump however it can, though the company continues to insist the merger has no bearing on its decisions.”
What will these sea changes mean for a Democratic Party that has come to rely more and more on sympathetic media outlets and audiences?
“Mark Halpern: ‘Democrats Don’t Realize How Much They Rely on Media Crutches Like Colbert and NPR/PBS,’” Tim Hains pointed out for Real Clear Politics on July 18, 2025.
“2-Way” host Mark Halperin declared the “left’s asymmetrical media advantage” “loser of the week” on his show.
“Stephen Colbert turned his show into a nightly anti-Trump program,” Halperin scoffed. “NPR and PBS, as Karoline Leavitt has well documented — they’re just attack machines for the Democrats. And they have lost their ability to have these asymmetrical advantages. Huge loss for them and a huge loss to the Democratic Party, which relied on these advantages.”
(Contributing writer, Brooke Bell)