https://rsf.org/en/us-agency-global-media-shutdown-rsf-warns-dangers-fac...
Following the Trump administration’s orders to dismantle the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is sounding the alarm over the risks facing USAGM staffers around the world, including nine journalists currently imprisoned abroad for their work. RSF calls on the international diplomatic community to immediately mobilise to obtain the release of these journalists and ensure the safety of all USAGM journalists worldwide.
In a decree issued on 14 March 2025, US President Donald Trump ordered the dismantling of USAGM, the federal agency overseeing several independent media outlets, such as Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and Radio Free Asia (RFA). On 15 March, Voice of America (VOA) employees received an email announcing they were immediately placed under administrative leave.
USAGM outlets provide crucial independent news in environments particularly hostile to press freedom, such as Belarus, Cambodia, China, North Korea, Laos, Russia and Vietnam.
USAGM journalists have faced serious danger to keep the public informed. Currently, nine of the ten USAGM staffers imprisoned across the globe are journalists: four in Vietnam, two in Russia, one in Belarus, one in Azerbaijan, and one in Myanmar. Some have received particularly harsh sentences, such as Ihar Losik, a contributor to RFE/RL’s Belarus service, who is serving a 15-year sentence in a hard labour colony on charges including “organisation of mass riots” and “incitement to hatred.”
“By shutting down USAGM and its media outlets, the Trump administration is sending a chilling signal: authoritarian regimes such as Beijing and Moscow now have free rein to spread their propaganda unchecked. This decision is all the more alarming as it betrays the nine journalists currently imprisoned for their work with the agency and leaves thousands more jobless and in danger – because of their past collaboration with USAGM media – worldwide. We urge the US authorities and the international diplomatic community to ensure journalists’ safety. Those detained must be released and granted full freedom without delay.
Many other journalists have also been targeted for simply giving interviews to USAGM-affiliated media. Among them is Pham Doan Trang, a laureate of the 2019 RSF Prize for Press Freedom who is serving a nine-year prison sentence for “propaganda against the state,” in part due to interviews she gave to the RFA Vietnamese Service (RFA Tiếng Việt).
The Trump administration’s move is part of a broader pattern of attacks and hostile rhetoric that seek to undermine USAGM and its outlets. Last month, Elon Musk, who heads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), called for the closure of VOA and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on his social media platform X, signalling a clear intent to silence these independent voices.
