In blunt and fiery testimony before Congress on Wednesday, U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) senior advisor Kari Lake delivered a scathing critique of the nearly \$1 billion taxpayer-funded agency, declaring it “rotten to the core” and on a path to being dismantled by 2026 under directives from President Donald Trump.
“This place is rotten. It’s rotten to the core,” Lake told the House Oversight Committee. “President Trump has asked me to go in and help clean it up… I don’t care if they attack me.”
Lake, who now oversees USAGM and its flagship outlet Voice of America (VOA), described an agency compromised by mismanagement, political bias, and possible foreign influence. Her remarks followed Trump’s own public condemnation of VOA on Truth Social, where he wrote, “Why would a Republican want Democrat ‘mouthpiece,’ Voice of America (VOA), to continue? It’s a TOTAL, LEFTWING DISASTER — No Republican should vote for its survival. KILL IT!”
Lake provided documentation to *Fox News Digital* showing House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) have requested records on USAGM’s hiring practices, conflicts of interest, and national security oversight. She accused grantee entities like VOA, Radio Free Asia, and the Open Technology Fund of blocking transparency efforts and resisting basic financial reviews.
“Nearly \$400 million… is going to these grantees, and they’ve stonewalled us… until the eleventh hour,” Lake said. “Last night, knowing I’d be sitting here, they finally agreed to say, ‘Oh, we’ll let you look at our books now.’ It’s a joke what’s going on.”
Lake didn’t mince words regarding internal influence concerns either, stating, “The \[Chinese Communist Party] has more control over what we put out editorially than people who are management at the agency,” and questioned whether pro-CCP employees still remain on staff.
Republicans on the committee backed her forcefully. Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) said the agency should have been shut down years ago. “It might look good, and it brings back old memories, but dadgum, it’s not very efficient,” he said.
Democrats pushed back hard. Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) accused Lake of gutting a strategic soft power tool. “You want it gone by 2026… You’re a propaganda machine for the Trump administration,” she said, adding, “You’ve lost your credibility.”
Rep. Julie Johnson (D-Texas) warned that dismantling VOA would “cede all of our soft power in the world to our adversaries.” Lake responded flatly, “Those are government numbers. And I don’t trust those numbers.”
Lake defended the downsizing as legally grounded and strategically sound. “We are doing what is statutorily required,” she said. “This newsroom should have been downsized a long time ago.”
Even Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.) voiced concern over the loss of U.S. broadcasting presence in strategic regions like Iran and North Korea. Lake responded, “We can do it with a smaller staff,” citing redundancies like overlapping Mandarin-language services at VOA and RFA.
Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.) compared USAGM’s nearly \$1 billion budget to iHeartMedia’s \$90 million national news operations, reinforcing GOP concerns over inefficiency.
Lake closed with a clear message: “We can do this smarter, leaner, and with loyalty to American values.” Her testimony made one thing unmistakably clear — the Trump-aligned overhaul of USAGM is moving swiftly, with broad Republican support and fierce Democratic opposition.
