Voice of America, which brought news to the corners of the Globe, where reliable journalism was scarce for eight decades, became dark in March after the Trump administration had reduced his financing and had taken his employees on leave.
But next week, journalists for the organization, an international news group funded by the US, are ready to go back to work, the director said, after a court victory has won last month, repairing his financing.
The director, Mike Abramowitz, said on Friday in an e -mail to his staff that the Ministry of Justice Voice of America had warned that the access of the broadcaster to his computer systems was being restored. The e -mail was obtained by the New York Times.
“I am looking for further details and I will share them as soon as possible,” wrote Mr Abramowitz. “But at first sight this news is a positive development.”
Voice of America, founded in 1942 to combat Nazi propaganda, was broadcast in 49 languages according to an estimated 360 million people around the world before President Trump moved his air waves.
The broadcaster has long been seen as an essential tool in America’s efforts to promote democracy worldwide, and it transferred news to countries such as Russia and Iran, where press freedoms were limited.
Mr. Trump has accused the voice of America of being biased against him and to manage the ‘voice of radical America’. He issued an executive order mid -March to dismantle The American Global Media Agency, the congress of the Congressional Chartered Agency that finances Voice of America and other international news stores supported by the government.
The Order targeted Parts of the federal bureaucracy that the president had established to be ‘superfluous’, said it. Almost immediately the approximately 1,300 employees of the Voice of America were sent home. The radio stations of the network were cut and the wire services were terminated.
A fight in the courts followed, with Voice of America and other news stores funded by the government with the argument that Mr Trump lacked the power to withdraw the financing authorized by the congress.
Last week Royce C. Lamberth, a federal judge in Washington, DC, who was appointed by former President Ronald Reagan, agreed. He a temporary order issued demand that the administration must restore the financing for Voice of America. The administration appealed against the decision.
The problem remains restless. A Federal Court of Appeal has left the ruling in which the government requires that the voice of America can resume its news programming. But the Court of Appeal said the administration Could for the time being to retain the financing of three broadcasters under the umbrella of the Global Media Agency: Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and Midden -East Temporary Networks.
Voice of America is a governmentaltity, in contrast to the other three broadcasters, which are federally financed private non -profit organizations.
Mr. Trump has one of his loyalists, Kari Lake, a former news anchor and senate candidate from Arizona to advise the Bureau of Worldwide Media. In an e -mail on Saturday, Mrs. Lake said that she was always planning to bring VOA in the 21st century. “
She added that ‘frivolous lawsuits’ her efforts to ‘streamline the voice of America’, delayed, but that she looked out to ‘effectively tell the story of America to a global audience’.
In lawsuits, journalists for Voice of America said that the Trump administration was involved in the ‘wholesaler’ dismantling of the broadcaster by ordering ‘almost the entire staff in order not to report to the work, dropping the service and locking the doors of the desk’.
On Friday evening, Voice of America’s Advocaten received the e -mail from the Ministry of Justice in which it was stated that the government was following the order of Judge Lamberth, Mr Abramowitz told his staff.
Peter Baker contributed reporting.
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