May 27, 2025 • 33 mins
In this episode of One Thing Trump Did, we explore the Trump Administration's attacks on public media, including an executive order banning federal funds for NPR and PBS. Jeremy is joined by Tim Black, President and CEO of Tri-State Public Media and WNIN in Evansville, Indiana. #NPR #PBS #CPB #Trump #funding #publicmedia #publicradio #funding
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:14):
Welcome to One Thing Trump did, available exclusively on The
Middle podcast feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson and if you're new
to OTTD as we call this podcast. Every week we
pick one thing coming out of the Trump White House
and focus on it in a non partisan way, just
like on the Middle, with someone who knows what they're
talking about. And our one thing this week is public media,
(00:35):
which is close to home. It's also under attack from
the Trump administration, with an executive order from the President
ordering the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to end funding for
NPR and PBS, the firing of CPB board members, and
the potential for a recision of hundreds of millions of
dollars already appropriated for public broadcasting by Congress. President Trump
(00:58):
has been talking about this for a while now here
Here's what he had to say in March about whether
or not he'd like to defund public media.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well, I would love to do that. I think it's
very unfair. It's been very biased the whole group, I
mean a whole group of them. And frankly, there's plenty
a little at all the media you have right now,
there's plenty of coverage. It was from a different age,
and they spend more money than any other network of
its type ever conceived, and I'd be honored to see
(01:26):
it end.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
So will federal funding for public media go away? And
what will happen if it does. Joining me now is
Tim Black, who is president and CEO of Tri State
Public Media and wnin in Evansville, Indiana. Tim, it is
great to have you on. Thanks a bunch, so, believe
it or not, Tim, I have a lot of contacts
in public media. I could have had a number of
people on to talk about this, but I chose you
(01:49):
because you've got it all here. Your station is both
TV and radio. It's not one of the big stations
that people say might be just fine without federal funding.
So tell us about WNI first of all.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Well, first of all, you've hit the nail exactly on
the head. We are a dual licensee, so we have
both a television station PBS station, and a radio station,
which of course is an NPR affiliate. To add another
layer to that, making us even a little bit more unique,
we are a community licensee. We're not affiliated with a
(02:25):
local university or a school, or a foundation or anything.
We're actually managed by a board of directors. That's made
up entirely of community citizens. We have been on the
air now, both television and radio, for just over fifty years.
We sit in the southernmost part of the state of Indiana.
(02:46):
In fact, my office looks out across the Ohio River
into Kentucky. And speaking of that, our market coverage area
includes the most part Indiana, but we also reach into
portions of Kentucky and than just a really small sliver
of Illinois. So I think that gives you the quick
(03:08):
overview of what's going on here.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Those are the try states that we're talking exactly, And
what's your budget like?
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Our budget is actually just right at about three million
dollars annually, and you know that certainly helps us to
get where we need to be, But we're also we
always stay very close to the edge of that. We
don't usually have a lot left over one way or
the other, and that's pretty much been the case for
(03:35):
quite some time. So we get just over half of
our support in that budget from the community that's made
up mostly of individual memberships and donations. We get some
amount of support from local corporate citizens, foundations, that kind
of thing, but I guess giving a little preview of
(03:58):
where we're going with this conversation. And we also are
pretty darn close to half of my budget coming in
from government sources, between federal funding and state funding.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
And how many people work at the station.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
We have officially right now we are at twenty six people,
and that's both full time and part time.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
And how many people do you serve or how many
people are in your market overall?
Speaker 3 (04:24):
We basically that that number is going to I'm going
to speak pretty broadly, but I mean across the entire
tri state area, we're probably bumping three hundred thousand people.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Now, you mentioned state funding. Indiana is in a tough
spot because the state pulled their funding of public broadcasting
kind of suddenly this year.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
What happened there, Well, you know, that's a great question, Jeremy.
I suppose. I wish I knew all the answers to that.
But from the time that you and I are talking
right now, we lost our entire tranch of state funding
about three weeks ago. And yes, it happened very quickly.
(05:06):
In fact, we were inside the week in which the
budget negotiations and debates were wrapping up that was scheduled
to happen on a Thursday evening. We being our group
of stations in Indiana, we have a loose cohort of
stations PBS, NPR stations in the state of Indiana that
(05:30):
are under the umbrella of Indiana Public Broadcasting Service, and
we do that for the purposes of lobbying for budget
money at the state House. We had been told as
a group on Tuesday of that week, two days before
the budget session wrapped up, that our funding was good,
that we should breathe easier, which we all did, and
(05:51):
then I got a late night email on Wednesday, I
was on an eight am zoom call on Thursday morning
telling us that it was going to get pulled out
of the budget. I mean, it all has happened very
very fast. We have been told that it had absolutely
nothing to do with any of the political chatter, any
of the particularly the national political chatter that's been going
(06:11):
on about public media, and that everything revolved around a
really bad revenue projection for the state that they had
received near the end of that process, and that that's
the reason that we lost our funding.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
And that's funding for all these public stations across the
state of Indiana. What does it mean for your station?
Speaker 3 (06:31):
In particular, well for the entire state for the past
several budget cycles now where we deal with a buy
ineum budget here in Indiana, so every two years we
go through this process. We have been getting as a
state three point sixty five million dollars per year. For
me specifically at WNI in that's about four hundred and
(06:54):
forty thousand dollars on an annual basis, which is pretty
close to about seven seventeen percent of my annual budget.
So it's a it's a big hit.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
So what did the cuts mean for your station?
Speaker 3 (07:07):
Well, at this point right now, we're fortunate that we
do have the benefit of some invested reserve funding that
we will be able to take advantage of in the
immediate time being. That's going to help us well. The
way that this all works, without getting too deep into
the weeds, we actually would have received about seventy five
(07:31):
percent of that four hundred and forty thousand dollars in August,
coming up in just about three four months now, that
was part of our current f y twenty twenty five budget.
Because we're not going to be receiving that, we are
going to rely on the assistance of reserve funding and
then as we go into the next two years, I'm
(07:52):
in the process right now putting together a plan for that.
We've had some very preliminary discussions with my board of
directors just last week. As a matter of fact, we
think we can survive for the next couple of years
by utilizing some of our reserve funding. And then, of
course the other parts of those cuts are simply going
(08:12):
to have to come from me pulling back a great
deal on programming that we offer here at the station
for the next two years. I'm trying my very very
best not to involve staff cuts, but at this point,
at this point, we're not there yet. But I certainly
cannot make any promises about that, and I've actually shared
(08:34):
that with my staff. I mean, that's something that they're
aware of also that I'm doing my very best. But
as we get deeper into these upcoming next two fiscal years,
you know, we may be forced to make some self decisions.
And of course that isn't even allowing into the conversation
the possibility of losing federal funding. This is just the
(08:56):
state funding that I know for sure we've lost already
for the next two years.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Okay, And of course this show is called one thing
Trump did, not one thing Bron did. Mike Bron the
governor of Indiana. So let's talk about the federal money
that also could be on the chopping block here. How
much money do you get from the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting and are you worried that you won't get that money?
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Well, in terms of the amount that we get, as
is true with most all public media stations around the country,
the bulk of the dollars that we receive from CPB
are directed toward television. As a total, since once again
we're a dual licensee. Across both of my stations, I
(09:38):
get a total of just over a million dollars and
pretty close to about nine hundred thousand of that is
directed for television and only about one hundred thousand or
so goes toward the radio station. And that's just the
way that the numbers work out. With that, that is
(09:59):
about thirty percent of my budget. So if you add
the state numbers to it, I'm getting really really close
to potentially losing half of my budget if the federal
dollars go away. So that would put us into a
very critical situation if that were to happen, and I
think second part of your question was whether or not
(10:21):
I thought this was going to happen right now. And
this is the statement that I make to everybody. I
have just been over the course of the last two weeks.
I was in Washington for a few days at an
NPR meeting. I've just returned yesterday, as a matter of fact,
from a meeting in Atlanta with PBS. Based on what
(10:45):
I'm hearing from all the folks at NPR and PBS
who are very very close to what's happening on Capitol Hill,
and my own visits to Capitol Hill, because during the
NPR meeting, I actually had the opportunity to meet with
three of our local representatives. Based on all of that,
(11:06):
I'll say this, I am much more confident now than
I was probably a month to two months ago that,
at least for the next two years of funding, I
think that we will get those dollars. And that is
primarily because the way the whole budget things work, the
(11:27):
dollars for the next two years have already been approved
and allocated by Congress. Losing those dollars would require Congress
to actually take a vote to pull that money back.
I do not think that that is going.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
To happen well, and we're going to talk about that
in a moment about the idea of recision which has
come up. Could the Trump administration pull back the money
that's already been appropriated by Congress. But if for some
reason you did lose your CPB funding and you did
lose your state already lost your state fund, sure, sure
(12:02):
does the money exist in a market like yours to
go find it elsewhere from donors and from companies and
organizations there or not.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
On a sustaining basis of knowing that we could count
on that kind of an influx of cash over the
course of several years. No, it does not exist, you know.
And once again I've already sort of been playing around
with those numbers. In my case here at WNI in
we're very fortunate that we own our building, which happens
(12:33):
to be in a very attractive part of downtown Evansville.
That would the possibility of selling our building and getting
involved in a process that would allow us to stay
in the building but then still sell the building to
a potential investor, and the kind of dollars that we
might be able to generate for that that would have
(12:55):
to be on the table for us to even consider
continuing operation for any period of time if we were
to lose federal money. I mean, that's how dire that
is for me, because those dollars. Simply to attempt to
find an extra million dollars, and if you add state
into it, basically a million and a half dollars on
(13:17):
an annual basis, that's not going to happen.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Yeah. I got to tell you, as somebody who's been
trying to raise money for this public radio show called
The Middle for the last two years, I can't even
imagine trying to find a million dollars. Ten thousand will
do it for me right now? That would feel good.
Let me ask you one more thing before we take
a break, Tim, You're in a pretty red area generally,
if you look at the politics of southern Indiana. Do
(13:43):
people in your community that you talk to hate public
broadcasting as much as Trump seems to.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
No, they do not. You're correct that. I mean, as
national political discussions go, people would certainly put the state
of Indiana in the red But and we do live
in a very conservative area. But and I would like
to think that that's because of my staff and hopefully
(14:12):
the way that that I manage our station here, that
that we we do try to manage things in a
good way. And as a result, I think this community
by and large sees the benefit of having a public
media station in its midst And you know, look, I've
been in this market for thirty two years now, so
I've got a pretty good finger on the pulse of
(14:34):
who's on what side of the aisle. And we get
a great deal of support from both both sides of
the aisle, and that has always been the case here.
But I don't hear the I just don't hear that
those drooling, you know, slobbering comments that you hear often
on the national scene about how horrible public media is
(14:56):
here and I and I think that's probably due in
large part that the folk ooks in my area here
are very very good at separating the national from local.
I think they really appreciate what this station does at
the local level, and for the most part, they appreciate
what goes on at the national level. But there's certainly
(15:17):
not the vitriol out there that you hear in a
lot of other places. I mean, we're very fortunate to
have a great deal of support in this community.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
We'll stay with us because we're going to be digging
into what this means for the future of public media
and what can be done to fight against this executive
order from the President. In just a moment, One Thing
Trump did with w ni n's Tim Black will be
right back. Welcome back to One Thing Trump did exclusively
(15:59):
on the Middle Podcast feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson. This episode,
we're talking about the recent executive order to end federal
funding for NPR and PBS through the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting and what that could mean for the future of
public broadcasting. I'm joined by Tim Black, who is president
and CEO of Tri State Public Media and wnin in Evansville, Indiana. Tim,
you mentioned that you were just at this meeting in Washington,
(16:21):
d C. With a lot of other general managers from
around the country. What can you tell us about the
mood overall and any conversations that you might have had there.
And are other leaders dealing with the exact same things
that you are? Is it different depending on where you
are in the country and how big your market is.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Well, I'll start the general mood. I think as won't
surprise anybody. I mean that the general mood is one
of nervousness and a lot of anxiety about what's going on.
I think everybody agrees, especially those who who've been involved
with public media for a long time. You know, public
media has never really had an easy ride. It always
(17:03):
seems to be in somebody's crosshairs. But the general feeling
among most of the people I was around is one
of that this time it's for real, and it's probably
more serious than it's ever been. Yes, a lot of
people are dealing with the very same things. I think
(17:24):
I was going to say, Surprisingly, that's not really accurate.
There are not In fact, I'm not sure there are
any other states right now that are dealing with the
cuts that we're dealing with in Indiana in terms of
state funding getting pulled, at least for those entities that
we're receiving state funding. There are a lot of states
in the country that don't even offer state funding. You know.
(17:47):
There are some stations that quite literally are two and
three months away from closing their doors going off the air.
They don't have reserve fundings, you know, to depend upon
or whatever if they were to lose federal funding.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
And how about NPR and PBS the big networks. Are
they in trouble because this executive order specifically says that
you can't use CPB money to send it to NPR
for example, Are they in trouble? And also stations that
have budget crunches, the most expensive thing in many cases
on their budgets is sending money to NPR. For all
(18:23):
things considered in Morning Edition.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Those definitely are the two most expensive line items in
my budget, or the licensing fees that I send to
PBS and NPR in order to carry that programming. So,
I mean, that's and I would suggest that that's probably
true for a great number of public media stations around
the country. I mean, certainly if they were facing a
(18:46):
situation in which they weren't receiving these fees that we
pay annually, we being the local stations, you know, in
terms of some of the numbers that I saw and
charts that I've seen even before, that portion of funding
is a pretty big chunk of what the networks receive,
(19:06):
you know, at the end of the day, though, there
are also national networks that are also receiving a great
deal of money from some national foundations and that kind
of thing. So when you get beyond that I will
say specifically, you mentioned the executive order that the President
recently issued. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting has been very
direct in their public comments about that that they do
(19:29):
not see any validity in that executive order, they do
not take it as legal, and they have stated again
very directly that they have no intention of changing any
of their practices, and they're in the process of dealing
with that executive order in the courts right now, as
is the case with so many of the executive orders
that have come out recently.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
One of the things that our listeners who are not
in the public media world may be noticing at this
point is that there are all these different players. It's
not like there's it's not like a network that owns
the affiliates that there are the member stations that pay
dues to carry NPR programming, for example, there's the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, which is not a government agency but
gets government funding, and then they give money to the
(20:13):
stations that then give money to NPR and PBS. So
it's it's kind of a mess. I mean, it's a
beautiful mess, but it's a mess. But I guess my
question is, are you seeing that as all of these
organizations are in trouble at the same time and for
the same sort of core reasons. Is there an overall
(20:33):
strategy or does it feel like it's every man and
woman for himself or herself in terms of figuring out
what to do.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Oh boy, that's a good question, Jeremy. I I you know,
I feel like that there is a there's a direction
in terms of you know, right now, it seems like
everything is mostly focused on what may or may not
be happening on capital and I feel like, certainly there's
(21:04):
a good handle on how all those processes work and
trying to follow the correct paths in terms of communication
and staying in touch with the right people. So I mean, yeah,
I think in the big picture, Jeremy, I feel like,
you know, people are generally moving in the same direction.
(21:27):
You know, is there a specific plan in place? I mean,
that's a tough one to answer, and you know, and
I would say that's primarily because, at least from from
what I've gathered recently at meetings and other conversations that
we're having, you know, there's still a lot of a
lot of options on the table from a federal budget standpoint,
(21:48):
as to what could potentially happen and happen with some
of these funds. I mean, obviously we've seen the executive
order already, but you mentioned earlier, I mean there's possibility
of recision, and then there's a possibility of impoundment of funds.
I mean, there are all kinds of things out there
that could happen, and so in some respects it does
seem like occasionally it's a bit of a whack a
(22:09):
mole game because you sort of have to wait and
see what happens before you know what plan you're going
to follow.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Okay, tough question, alert, Tim. Should there be more consolidation
among public radio stations? Why do there need to be
so many different stations? For example, in the state of Indiana,
couldn't you you be part of one big statewide network.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Well, you know what I mean. Yeah, it's a tough question, Jeremy.
But I also can be very frank with you that
since my cohort of stations in the state of Indiana
found out that we're losing our state funding, we are
already at least having the very beginnings of conversations about,
you know, the possibility of some kind of consolidation. But
(22:51):
I mean, that's just so close to the beginning. There's
not a lot of detail about that yet. I mean,
do there need to be fewer stations? I mean maybe so.
I mean, I'll say it this way. You know, I
am originally from Kentucky, and I spent most of my
growing up years in the state of Kentucky. So I'm
very familiar with the Kentucky Educational Television Network, which most
(23:13):
people know is k ET, and that is I think
the prime example of how statewide networks, or you can
call it consolidation should be. And being familiar with that,
you know, I think that works very well. And so
to answer your question, you know, whether there should be
(23:33):
more of that, I certainly think there should be more
states exploring that as a possibility, because I think it
can work. You know, local is such a big part
of what all these stations provide to their communities. But
you know, but but there is a way to continue that.
You know, I also spent a good in many of
my professional years in the commercial broadcast business as well
(23:54):
as a CBS and a Fox affiliate. You know, that
works pretty well too. You're you're tied to a national entity,
but you also still retain a very real local presence,
And I guess my opinion is that there's no reason
why public media couldn't follow the same model and make
something work.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Yeah, I have to say, and this is controversial too.
I don't think that at this point there should be
major cities in this country that have two competing public
radio stations who compete against each other, and there are
many of them these days. You could easily have them
be under the same umbrella so that they can go
after the same donors, They can go after the same
(24:34):
foundational support, the same corporate sponsors, and not have to
be competing against each other and still serve the audience
in the exact same way, even if they have two channels. Anyway,
let me just ask you about some of the things
that we haven't really talked about that Trump is trying
to do. Number One, he's tried to fire the board
members of the Corporates for Public Broadcasting that were appointed
(24:56):
by Joe Biden that has been said to be not legal.
Is that still are they still fired? What's going on
with them?
Speaker 3 (25:03):
That is the only thing that I can report about
that is I know that I think they had an
initial hearing about that May fourteenth. I don't think anything
has been ultimately decided with that, but yes, it seemed
like from what I have gathered from the folks at
CPB and at some of the meetings again, I was
at that that's moving in the direction of that not
(25:24):
being able to happen. I see, CPB technically is not
a federal agency's federal dollars, but it's not necessarily under
the umbrella, at least in the court's eyes of the
Executive Rynch.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
Yeah, the DOSE people tried to get into CPB and
they could not do it for that very reason. You've
talked about the idea of recision of funding that's already
been appropriated. It sounds like you are not so worried
about that happening.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
I mean, that's only tim talking from what I intending
to gather, there is a feeling among the lobbyists and
the people again who spend a lot of time on
Capitol Hill, from both the national public media level, who
believe pretty strongly that the reason we saw in executive
(26:08):
order from the White House instead of an actual recision
request to Congress is because the votes were not there
for that recision request to be successful again. I only
visited three individuals on Capitol Hill. I visited the congressional
representative in my district here in southern Indiana, congressional representative
(26:29):
in the district across the river in Kentucky, and one
of my senators in Indiana, Senator Todd Young. I can
speak very specifically that in speaking to the staff member
in Senator Young's office, she made it very clear, not clear.
She said to me in the office that she wouldn't
come down one way or the other and say that
the Senator would vote for recision or wouldn't vote for
(26:51):
recision if asked, but that his opinion in his office
is that it's not right to take money back that
has been promise. So I'm taking that as a really
positive statement from a Republican senator.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And what about the executive order that says you can't
spend money on NPR programming if you get money from CPB.
Is that happening.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
The only thing I can see about that, Jeremy, is
from what CPB has told the stations and has also
made public statements, they are not abiding by any of
the directives in that executive order. Until I suppose they
would say they're forced to do so because they do not.
They do not see themselves as an agency of the
(27:35):
federal government that the President has any say so or
control over, and so they have stated very bluntly that
they have no intention of changing any of their practices
right now, and we've seen no evidence of them doing that.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Let me finally just come back to you and WNIN
and your community there. What would happen to local news
in southern Indiana if there were no WNIN?
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Local news has changed a lot, and I do not
think for the better local news anymore on commercial television
stations generally is a lot of crime and a lot
of weather. There's nothing else beyond that. Newspapers, if they
even still exist in a local community, are usually being
(28:20):
funneled state wide news or national news. There's very little
local reporting. You know, wni in is not perfect, and
we don't have a huge newsroom, but we do still.
You know, we cover our local government. We go to
local community and civic meetings. We cover the city council,
we cover the county council. We are doing our very
(28:41):
best to talk to our state wide elected representatives, whether
they support us or not. We feel like at WNI
in and I think I can speak for a lot
of public media around the country. We're reporting local community
important information, civic information that need to know about, and
(29:02):
I do not think that that is happening elsewhere in
most local markets. So if you lose public media, boy,
you're going to lose a lot of information that is
it's necessary to democracy, whether you're talking about that on
a national level or on a local level. The weather
and who got arrested last night are not going to
do that from a lot of other local entities, and
public media still tries to take care of the things
(29:25):
that they should be taken care of.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
I agree with you and not to turn this into
a pledge drive, But when the media ecosystem is now
full of entities that are owned by billionaires, that are
commercially focused, that are maybe politically motivated to have public
media that is not any of those things. And it's
not perfect and sometimes but nobody is. It is not
(29:50):
perfect in terms of always being exactly as fair as
you would want it to be, but nobody is. And
I know from a lifetime in public media that everybody
I've worked with, almost everybody I've worked with, has tried
as hard as they can to truly be factual, fair, enlightened.
Inform really just helped educate the society in an important way.
(30:12):
So it is a really important part, I believe. And
you know, I can't be unbiased on this one because
I've been in public media my entire life. You have
been in it for a very long time as well. Tim,
What got you into this business in the first place.
Speaker 3 (30:27):
Well, I mean, the factual answer to that question is that,
you know, being in commercial media. The local commercial station
that I was managing was sold to a much larger
corporate entity just sort of as you were describing. As
often as the case, the top guy on the list
gets thrown out, so that's what happened. Unfortunately, the local
public media station picked me up. But I had always
(30:50):
been associated with public media, and I think it's it's
primarily because a lot of what you just said, Jere.
I mean, I do think I feel like media. The
media has a lot of power, and the individuals who
work in media have a lot of power, and you
can make a decision to use that in a good
(31:10):
way or in a bad way. And I think public
media does good work. They tell good stories, they put
important information in front of people, and they deliver that consistently.
Commercial media doesn't always do that. And I can say
that because I was in it for a long time.
(31:31):
With public media, I think it's a little different. And
if you can at least put the information out there,
you always have a chance of hitting people. Because it's free.
I think that's important. It is free and anybody who
has the ability to use an intenna or you know,
whether it's turned on the radio or watch television, can
get that information. And so I really like that. I
(31:52):
like being able to do stories that are important to
the community that you can't do in other places, because
sometimes it's even a matter of time. We can spend
the amount of time often in public media to tell
a story that you don't have the ability to do
in the commercial world, whereas in public media, I can
take an hour and a half if I need to
to tell a story. Sometimes that's necessary. So I just
(32:13):
like that. I like the fact that it's so local.
You can do important stuff in public media and you
can't always do that in the commercial world.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Yeah, and I'm glad that you brought up that it
is free, because as we hear every week on the
middle when we open the phones, you just hear from
all kinds of people. You never know who's going to
be listening when you don't have to pay a subscription
to get the product.
Speaker 3 (32:34):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
That is Tim Black, who is the president and CEO
of Tri State Public Media and WNIN in Evansville, Indiana.
Tim is so great to talk with you. I hope
things work out well for you. You give me a little
bit of optimism from this conversation. Thank you so much
for joining us.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
Thanks Jeremy, and thanks you.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
For listening to One Thing Trump Did. It was produced
by Harrison Patino. Our next middle episode is coming to
your podcast feed later this week. We're going to be
asking if the cost of solid education is still worth it.
And if you like this podcast, please rate it wherever
you get your podcasts and write us a review. Our
theme music was composed by Noah Haid. I'm Jeremy Hobson.
Talk to you soon.
Welcome to One Thing Trump did, available exclusively on The
Middle podcast feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson and if you're new
to OTTD as we call this podcast. Every week we
pick one thing coming out of the Trump White House
and focus on it in a non partisan way, just
like on the Middle, with someone who knows what they're
talking about. And our one thing this week is public media,
(00:35):
which is close to home. It's also under attack from
the Trump administration, with an executive order from the President
ordering the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to end funding for
NPR and PBS, the firing of CPB board members, and
the potential for a recision of hundreds of millions of
dollars already appropriated for public broadcasting by Congress. President Trump
(00:58):
has been talking about this for a while now here
Here's what he had to say in March about whether
or not he'd like to defund public media.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Well, I would love to do that. I think it's
very unfair. It's been very biased the whole group, I
mean a whole group of them. And frankly, there's plenty
a little at all the media you have right now,
there's plenty of coverage. It was from a different age,
and they spend more money than any other network of
its type ever conceived, and I'd be honored to see
(01:26):
it end.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
So will federal funding for public media go away? And
what will happen if it does. Joining me now is
Tim Black, who is president and CEO of Tri State
Public Media and wnin in Evansville, Indiana. Tim, it is
great to have you on. Thanks a bunch, so, believe
it or not, Tim, I have a lot of contacts
in public media. I could have had a number of
people on to talk about this, but I chose you
(01:49):
because you've got it all here. Your station is both
TV and radio. It's not one of the big stations
that people say might be just fine without federal funding.
So tell us about WNI first of all.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
Well, first of all, you've hit the nail exactly on
the head. We are a dual licensee, so we have
both a television station PBS station, and a radio station,
which of course is an NPR affiliate. To add another
layer to that, making us even a little bit more unique,
we are a community licensee. We're not affiliated with a
(02:25):
local university or a school, or a foundation or anything.
We're actually managed by a board of directors. That's made
up entirely of community citizens. We have been on the
air now, both television and radio, for just over fifty years.
We sit in the southernmost part of the state of Indiana.
(02:46):
In fact, my office looks out across the Ohio River
into Kentucky. And speaking of that, our market coverage area
includes the most part Indiana, but we also reach into
portions of Kentucky and than just a really small sliver
of Illinois. So I think that gives you the quick
(03:08):
overview of what's going on here.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Those are the try states that we're talking exactly, And
what's your budget like?
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Our budget is actually just right at about three million
dollars annually, and you know that certainly helps us to
get where we need to be, But we're also we
always stay very close to the edge of that. We
don't usually have a lot left over one way or
the other, and that's pretty much been the case for
(03:35):
quite some time. So we get just over half of
our support in that budget from the community that's made
up mostly of individual memberships and donations. We get some
amount of support from local corporate citizens, foundations, that kind
of thing, but I guess giving a little preview of
(03:58):
where we're going with this conversation. And we also are
pretty darn close to half of my budget coming in
from government sources, between federal funding and state funding.
Speaker 1 (04:09):
And how many people work at the station.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
We have officially right now we are at twenty six people,
and that's both full time and part time.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
And how many people do you serve or how many
people are in your market overall?
Speaker 3 (04:24):
We basically that that number is going to I'm going
to speak pretty broadly, but I mean across the entire
tri state area, we're probably bumping three hundred thousand people.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Now, you mentioned state funding. Indiana is in a tough
spot because the state pulled their funding of public broadcasting
kind of suddenly this year.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
What happened there, Well, you know, that's a great question, Jeremy.
I suppose. I wish I knew all the answers to that.
But from the time that you and I are talking
right now, we lost our entire tranch of state funding
about three weeks ago. And yes, it happened very quickly.
(05:06):
In fact, we were inside the week in which the
budget negotiations and debates were wrapping up that was scheduled
to happen on a Thursday evening. We being our group
of stations in Indiana, we have a loose cohort of
stations PBS, NPR stations in the state of Indiana that
(05:30):
are under the umbrella of Indiana Public Broadcasting Service, and
we do that for the purposes of lobbying for budget
money at the state House. We had been told as
a group on Tuesday of that week, two days before
the budget session wrapped up, that our funding was good,
that we should breathe easier, which we all did, and
(05:51):
then I got a late night email on Wednesday, I
was on an eight am zoom call on Thursday morning
telling us that it was going to get pulled out
of the budget. I mean, it all has happened very
very fast. We have been told that it had absolutely
nothing to do with any of the political chatter, any
of the particularly the national political chatter that's been going
(06:11):
on about public media, and that everything revolved around a
really bad revenue projection for the state that they had
received near the end of that process, and that that's
the reason that we lost our funding.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
And that's funding for all these public stations across the
state of Indiana. What does it mean for your station?
Speaker 3 (06:31):
In particular, well for the entire state for the past
several budget cycles now where we deal with a buy
ineum budget here in Indiana, so every two years we
go through this process. We have been getting as a
state three point sixty five million dollars per year. For
me specifically at WNI in that's about four hundred and
(06:54):
forty thousand dollars on an annual basis, which is pretty
close to about seven seventeen percent of my annual budget.
So it's a it's a big hit.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
So what did the cuts mean for your station?
Speaker 3 (07:07):
Well, at this point right now, we're fortunate that we
do have the benefit of some invested reserve funding that
we will be able to take advantage of in the
immediate time being. That's going to help us well. The
way that this all works, without getting too deep into
the weeds, we actually would have received about seventy five
(07:31):
percent of that four hundred and forty thousand dollars in August,
coming up in just about three four months now, that
was part of our current f y twenty twenty five budget.
Because we're not going to be receiving that, we are
going to rely on the assistance of reserve funding and
then as we go into the next two years, I'm
(07:52):
in the process right now putting together a plan for that.
We've had some very preliminary discussions with my board of
directors just last week. As a matter of fact, we
think we can survive for the next couple of years
by utilizing some of our reserve funding. And then, of
course the other parts of those cuts are simply going
(08:12):
to have to come from me pulling back a great
deal on programming that we offer here at the station
for the next two years. I'm trying my very very
best not to involve staff cuts, but at this point,
at this point, we're not there yet. But I certainly
cannot make any promises about that, and I've actually shared
(08:34):
that with my staff. I mean, that's something that they're
aware of also that I'm doing my very best. But
as we get deeper into these upcoming next two fiscal years,
you know, we may be forced to make some self decisions.
And of course that isn't even allowing into the conversation
the possibility of losing federal funding. This is just the
(08:56):
state funding that I know for sure we've lost already
for the next two years.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Okay, And of course this show is called one thing
Trump did, not one thing Bron did. Mike Bron the
governor of Indiana. So let's talk about the federal money
that also could be on the chopping block here. How
much money do you get from the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting and are you worried that you won't get that money?
Speaker 3 (09:18):
Well, in terms of the amount that we get, as
is true with most all public media stations around the country,
the bulk of the dollars that we receive from CPB
are directed toward television. As a total, since once again
we're a dual licensee. Across both of my stations, I
(09:38):
get a total of just over a million dollars and
pretty close to about nine hundred thousand of that is
directed for television and only about one hundred thousand or
so goes toward the radio station. And that's just the
way that the numbers work out. With that, that is
(09:59):
about thirty percent of my budget. So if you add
the state numbers to it, I'm getting really really close
to potentially losing half of my budget if the federal
dollars go away. So that would put us into a
very critical situation if that were to happen, and I
think second part of your question was whether or not
(10:21):
I thought this was going to happen right now. And
this is the statement that I make to everybody. I
have just been over the course of the last two weeks.
I was in Washington for a few days at an
NPR meeting. I've just returned yesterday, as a matter of fact,
from a meeting in Atlanta with PBS. Based on what
(10:45):
I'm hearing from all the folks at NPR and PBS
who are very very close to what's happening on Capitol Hill,
and my own visits to Capitol Hill, because during the
NPR meeting, I actually had the opportunity to meet with
three of our local representatives. Based on all of that,
(11:06):
I'll say this, I am much more confident now than
I was probably a month to two months ago that,
at least for the next two years of funding, I
think that we will get those dollars. And that is
primarily because the way the whole budget things work, the
(11:27):
dollars for the next two years have already been approved
and allocated by Congress. Losing those dollars would require Congress
to actually take a vote to pull that money back.
I do not think that that is going.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
To happen well, and we're going to talk about that
in a moment about the idea of recision which has
come up. Could the Trump administration pull back the money
that's already been appropriated by Congress. But if for some
reason you did lose your CPB funding and you did
lose your state already lost your state fund, sure, sure
(12:02):
does the money exist in a market like yours to
go find it elsewhere from donors and from companies and
organizations there or not.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
On a sustaining basis of knowing that we could count
on that kind of an influx of cash over the
course of several years. No, it does not exist, you know.
And once again I've already sort of been playing around
with those numbers. In my case here at WNI in
we're very fortunate that we own our building, which happens
(12:33):
to be in a very attractive part of downtown Evansville.
That would the possibility of selling our building and getting
involved in a process that would allow us to stay
in the building but then still sell the building to
a potential investor, and the kind of dollars that we
might be able to generate for that that would have
(12:55):
to be on the table for us to even consider
continuing operation for any period of time if we were
to lose federal money. I mean, that's how dire that
is for me, because those dollars. Simply to attempt to
find an extra million dollars, and if you add state
into it, basically a million and a half dollars on
(13:17):
an annual basis, that's not going to happen.
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Yeah. I got to tell you, as somebody who's been
trying to raise money for this public radio show called
The Middle for the last two years, I can't even
imagine trying to find a million dollars. Ten thousand will
do it for me right now? That would feel good.
Let me ask you one more thing before we take
a break, Tim, You're in a pretty red area generally,
if you look at the politics of southern Indiana. Do
(13:43):
people in your community that you talk to hate public
broadcasting as much as Trump seems to.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
No, they do not. You're correct that. I mean, as
national political discussions go, people would certainly put the state
of Indiana in the red But and we do live
in a very conservative area. But and I would like
to think that that's because of my staff and hopefully
(14:12):
the way that that I manage our station here, that
that we we do try to manage things in a
good way. And as a result, I think this community
by and large sees the benefit of having a public
media station in its midst And you know, look, I've
been in this market for thirty two years now, so
I've got a pretty good finger on the pulse of
(14:34):
who's on what side of the aisle. And we get
a great deal of support from both both sides of
the aisle, and that has always been the case here.
But I don't hear the I just don't hear that
those drooling, you know, slobbering comments that you hear often
on the national scene about how horrible public media is
(14:56):
here and I and I think that's probably due in
large part that the folk ooks in my area here
are very very good at separating the national from local.
I think they really appreciate what this station does at
the local level, and for the most part, they appreciate
what goes on at the national level. But there's certainly
(15:17):
not the vitriol out there that you hear in a
lot of other places. I mean, we're very fortunate to
have a great deal of support in this community.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
We'll stay with us because we're going to be digging
into what this means for the future of public media
and what can be done to fight against this executive
order from the President. In just a moment, One Thing
Trump did with w ni n's Tim Black will be
right back. Welcome back to One Thing Trump did exclusively
(15:59):
on the Middle Podcast feed. I'm Jeremy Hobson. This episode,
we're talking about the recent executive order to end federal
funding for NPR and PBS through the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting and what that could mean for the future of
public broadcasting. I'm joined by Tim Black, who is president
and CEO of Tri State Public Media and wnin in Evansville, Indiana. Tim,
you mentioned that you were just at this meeting in Washington,
(16:21):
d C. With a lot of other general managers from
around the country. What can you tell us about the
mood overall and any conversations that you might have had there.
And are other leaders dealing with the exact same things
that you are? Is it different depending on where you
are in the country and how big your market is.
Speaker 3 (16:41):
Well, I'll start the general mood. I think as won't
surprise anybody. I mean that the general mood is one
of nervousness and a lot of anxiety about what's going on.
I think everybody agrees, especially those who who've been involved
with public media for a long time. You know, public
media has never really had an easy ride. It always
(17:03):
seems to be in somebody's crosshairs. But the general feeling
among most of the people I was around is one
of that this time it's for real, and it's probably
more serious than it's ever been. Yes, a lot of
people are dealing with the very same things. I think
(17:24):
I was going to say, Surprisingly, that's not really accurate.
There are not In fact, I'm not sure there are
any other states right now that are dealing with the
cuts that we're dealing with in Indiana in terms of
state funding getting pulled, at least for those entities that
we're receiving state funding. There are a lot of states
in the country that don't even offer state funding. You know.
(17:47):
There are some stations that quite literally are two and
three months away from closing their doors going off the air.
They don't have reserve fundings, you know, to depend upon
or whatever if they were to lose federal funding.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
And how about NPR and PBS the big networks. Are
they in trouble because this executive order specifically says that
you can't use CPB money to send it to NPR
for example, Are they in trouble? And also stations that
have budget crunches, the most expensive thing in many cases
on their budgets is sending money to NPR. For all
(18:23):
things considered in Morning Edition.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Those definitely are the two most expensive line items in
my budget, or the licensing fees that I send to
PBS and NPR in order to carry that programming. So,
I mean, that's and I would suggest that that's probably
true for a great number of public media stations around
the country. I mean, certainly if they were facing a
(18:46):
situation in which they weren't receiving these fees that we
pay annually, we being the local stations, you know, in
terms of some of the numbers that I saw and
charts that I've seen even before, that portion of funding
is a pretty big chunk of what the networks receive,
(19:06):
you know, at the end of the day, though, there
are also national networks that are also receiving a great
deal of money from some national foundations and that kind
of thing. So when you get beyond that I will
say specifically, you mentioned the executive order that the President
recently issued. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting has been very
direct in their public comments about that that they do
(19:29):
not see any validity in that executive order, they do
not take it as legal, and they have stated again
very directly that they have no intention of changing any
of their practices, and they're in the process of dealing
with that executive order in the courts right now, as
is the case with so many of the executive orders
that have come out recently.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
One of the things that our listeners who are not
in the public media world may be noticing at this
point is that there are all these different players. It's
not like there's it's not like a network that owns
the affiliates that there are the member stations that pay
dues to carry NPR programming, for example, there's the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting, which is not a government agency but
gets government funding, and then they give money to the
(20:13):
stations that then give money to NPR and PBS. So
it's it's kind of a mess. I mean, it's a
beautiful mess, but it's a mess. But I guess my
question is, are you seeing that as all of these
organizations are in trouble at the same time and for
the same sort of core reasons. Is there an overall
(20:33):
strategy or does it feel like it's every man and
woman for himself or herself in terms of figuring out
what to do.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Oh boy, that's a good question, Jeremy. I I you know,
I feel like that there is a there's a direction
in terms of you know, right now, it seems like
everything is mostly focused on what may or may not
be happening on capital and I feel like, certainly there's
(21:04):
a good handle on how all those processes work and
trying to follow the correct paths in terms of communication
and staying in touch with the right people. So I mean, yeah,
I think in the big picture, Jeremy, I feel like,
you know, people are generally moving in the same direction.
(21:27):
You know, is there a specific plan in place? I mean,
that's a tough one to answer, and you know, and
I would say that's primarily because, at least from from
what I've gathered recently at meetings and other conversations that
we're having, you know, there's still a lot of a
lot of options on the table from a federal budget standpoint,
(21:48):
as to what could potentially happen and happen with some
of these funds. I mean, obviously we've seen the executive
order already, but you mentioned earlier, I mean there's possibility
of recision, and then there's a possibility of impoundment of funds.
I mean, there are all kinds of things out there
that could happen, and so in some respects it does
seem like occasionally it's a bit of a whack a
(22:09):
mole game because you sort of have to wait and
see what happens before you know what plan you're going
to follow.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Okay, tough question, alert, Tim. Should there be more consolidation
among public radio stations? Why do there need to be
so many different stations? For example, in the state of Indiana,
couldn't you you be part of one big statewide network.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Well, you know what I mean. Yeah, it's a tough question, Jeremy.
But I also can be very frank with you that
since my cohort of stations in the state of Indiana
found out that we're losing our state funding, we are
already at least having the very beginnings of conversations about,
you know, the possibility of some kind of consolidation. But
(22:51):
I mean, that's just so close to the beginning. There's
not a lot of detail about that yet. I mean,
do there need to be fewer stations? I mean maybe so.
I mean, I'll say it this way. You know, I
am originally from Kentucky, and I spent most of my
growing up years in the state of Kentucky. So I'm
very familiar with the Kentucky Educational Television Network, which most
(23:13):
people know is k ET, and that is I think
the prime example of how statewide networks, or you can
call it consolidation should be. And being familiar with that,
you know, I think that works very well. And so
to answer your question, you know, whether there should be
(23:33):
more of that, I certainly think there should be more
states exploring that as a possibility, because I think it
can work. You know, local is such a big part
of what all these stations provide to their communities. But
you know, but but there is a way to continue that.
You know, I also spent a good in many of
my professional years in the commercial broadcast business as well
(23:54):
as a CBS and a Fox affiliate. You know, that
works pretty well too. You're you're tied to a national entity,
but you also still retain a very real local presence,
And I guess my opinion is that there's no reason
why public media couldn't follow the same model and make
something work.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Yeah, I have to say, and this is controversial too.
I don't think that at this point there should be
major cities in this country that have two competing public
radio stations who compete against each other, and there are
many of them these days. You could easily have them
be under the same umbrella so that they can go
after the same donors, They can go after the same
(24:34):
foundational support, the same corporate sponsors, and not have to
be competing against each other and still serve the audience
in the exact same way, even if they have two channels. Anyway,
let me just ask you about some of the things
that we haven't really talked about that Trump is trying
to do. Number One, he's tried to fire the board
members of the Corporates for Public Broadcasting that were appointed
(24:56):
by Joe Biden that has been said to be not legal.
Is that still are they still fired? What's going on
with them?
Speaker 3 (25:03):
That is the only thing that I can report about
that is I know that I think they had an
initial hearing about that May fourteenth. I don't think anything
has been ultimately decided with that, but yes, it seemed
like from what I have gathered from the folks at
CPB and at some of the meetings again, I was
at that that's moving in the direction of that not
(25:24):
being able to happen. I see, CPB technically is not
a federal agency's federal dollars, but it's not necessarily under
the umbrella, at least in the court's eyes of the
Executive Rynch.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
Yeah, the DOSE people tried to get into CPB and
they could not do it for that very reason. You've
talked about the idea of recision of funding that's already
been appropriated. It sounds like you are not so worried
about that happening.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
I mean, that's only tim talking from what I intending
to gather, there is a feeling among the lobbyists and
the people again who spend a lot of time on
Capitol Hill, from both the national public media level, who
believe pretty strongly that the reason we saw in executive
(26:08):
order from the White House instead of an actual recision
request to Congress is because the votes were not there
for that recision request to be successful again. I only
visited three individuals on Capitol Hill. I visited the congressional
representative in my district here in southern Indiana, congressional representative
(26:29):
in the district across the river in Kentucky, and one
of my senators in Indiana, Senator Todd Young. I can
speak very specifically that in speaking to the staff member
in Senator Young's office, she made it very clear, not clear.
She said to me in the office that she wouldn't
come down one way or the other and say that
the Senator would vote for recision or wouldn't vote for
(26:51):
recision if asked, but that his opinion in his office
is that it's not right to take money back that
has been promise. So I'm taking that as a really
positive statement from a Republican senator.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And what about the executive order that says you can't
spend money on NPR programming if you get money from CPB.
Is that happening.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
The only thing I can see about that, Jeremy, is
from what CPB has told the stations and has also
made public statements, they are not abiding by any of
the directives in that executive order. Until I suppose they
would say they're forced to do so because they do not.
They do not see themselves as an agency of the
(27:35):
federal government that the President has any say so or
control over, and so they have stated very bluntly that
they have no intention of changing any of their practices
right now, and we've seen no evidence of them doing that.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Let me finally just come back to you and WNIN
and your community there. What would happen to local news
in southern Indiana if there were no WNIN?
Speaker 3 (28:00):
Local news has changed a lot, and I do not
think for the better local news anymore on commercial television
stations generally is a lot of crime and a lot
of weather. There's nothing else beyond that. Newspapers, if they
even still exist in a local community, are usually being
(28:20):
funneled state wide news or national news. There's very little
local reporting. You know, wni in is not perfect, and
we don't have a huge newsroom, but we do still.
You know, we cover our local government. We go to
local community and civic meetings. We cover the city council,
we cover the county council. We are doing our very
(28:41):
best to talk to our state wide elected representatives, whether
they support us or not. We feel like at WNI
in and I think I can speak for a lot
of public media around the country. We're reporting local community
important information, civic information that need to know about, and
(29:02):
I do not think that that is happening elsewhere in
most local markets. So if you lose public media, boy,
you're going to lose a lot of information that is
it's necessary to democracy, whether you're talking about that on
a national level or on a local level. The weather
and who got arrested last night are not going to
do that from a lot of other local entities, and
public media still tries to take care of the things
(29:25):
that they should be taken care of.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
I agree with you and not to turn this into
a pledge drive, But when the media ecosystem is now
full of entities that are owned by billionaires, that are
commercially focused, that are maybe politically motivated to have public
media that is not any of those things. And it's
not perfect and sometimes but nobody is. It is not
(29:50):
perfect in terms of always being exactly as fair as
you would want it to be, but nobody is. And
I know from a lifetime in public media that everybody
I've worked with, almost everybody I've worked with, has tried
as hard as they can to truly be factual, fair, enlightened.
Inform really just helped educate the society in an important way.
(30:12):
So it is a really important part, I believe. And
you know, I can't be unbiased on this one because
I've been in public media my entire life. You have
been in it for a very long time as well. Tim,
What got you into this business in the first place.
Speaker 3 (30:27):
Well, I mean, the factual answer to that question is that,
you know, being in commercial media. The local commercial station
that I was managing was sold to a much larger
corporate entity just sort of as you were describing. As
often as the case, the top guy on the list
gets thrown out, so that's what happened. Unfortunately, the local
public media station picked me up. But I had always
(30:50):
been associated with public media, and I think it's it's
primarily because a lot of what you just said, Jere.
I mean, I do think I feel like media. The
media has a lot of power, and the individuals who
work in media have a lot of power, and you
can make a decision to use that in a good
(31:10):
way or in a bad way. And I think public
media does good work. They tell good stories, they put
important information in front of people, and they deliver that consistently.
Commercial media doesn't always do that. And I can say
that because I was in it for a long time.
(31:31):
With public media, I think it's a little different. And
if you can at least put the information out there,
you always have a chance of hitting people. Because it's free.
I think that's important. It is free and anybody who
has the ability to use an intenna or you know,
whether it's turned on the radio or watch television, can
get that information. And so I really like that. I
(31:52):
like being able to do stories that are important to
the community that you can't do in other places, because
sometimes it's even a matter of time. We can spend
the amount of time often in public media to tell
a story that you don't have the ability to do
in the commercial world, whereas in public media, I can
take an hour and a half if I need to
to tell a story. Sometimes that's necessary. So I just
(32:13):
like that. I like the fact that it's so local.
You can do important stuff in public media and you
can't always do that in the commercial world.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Yeah, and I'm glad that you brought up that it
is free, because as we hear every week on the
middle when we open the phones, you just hear from
all kinds of people. You never know who's going to
be listening when you don't have to pay a subscription
to get the product.
Speaker 3 (32:34):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
That is Tim Black, who is the president and CEO
of Tri State Public Media and WNIN in Evansville, Indiana.
Tim is so great to talk with you. I hope
things work out well for you. You give me a little
bit of optimism from this conversation. Thank you so much
for joining us.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
Thanks Jeremy, and thanks you.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
For listening to One Thing Trump Did. It was produced
by Harrison Patino. Our next middle episode is coming to
your podcast feed later this week. We're going to be
asking if the cost of solid education is still worth it.
And if you like this podcast, please rate it wherever
you get your podcasts and write us a review. Our
theme music was composed by Noah Haid. I'm Jeremy Hobson.
Talk to you soon.
Host
Jeremy Hobson
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