During a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Wednesday, Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-FL) questioned USAGM Kari Lake about Voice Of America.
00:00Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, Miss Lake, for being here. I do have major concerns about the role that VOA plays, especially since as recently as a few months ago, there were over four hundred and twenty seven million people who are actually being exposed to VOA and VOA is usually one of the best places that we can provide fact based and objective information to audiences, especially in China and Iran, especially with the escalation that we're seeing in Iran and with
00:29lack of any kind of intelligence briefing. We want to get more information as far as what's actually going going on in Iran and the information we're providing them. But what I wanted to bring to your attention is a letter that we have here that I wanted to admit into the for the record. And it is from Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, Middle East Broadcasting Network. And what they're pretty much saying is that they tried several times to reach you.
00:57Pass it on back.
01:00I'm going to read it. The last one didn't have a request.
01:01I think I've already expressed why I haven't met with them because we're in active litigation.
01:04I just want to read to you first because I want to give you the opportunity.
01:06I do believe that foreign affairs, especially when it comes to national security, shouldn't be a bipartisan issue. I do believe that. And I want to give you the opportunity to just explain because as one of my colleagues mentioned, there was a letter in April where they said they haven't met with you.
01:20And in this letter, they're saying that they've tried to meet with you and that Miss Lake has not spent a single minute with us or a senior team. She has not visited our office or inspected our operations.
01:31And so with this letter that we have here that clearly says it, I also want to bring to your attention where it says also that they're still open to meeting with you.
01:40And I know now you're saying you can't meet with them, but I want to get more clarification. Within the two weeks that you were in your position that you declared that it was, you said specifically that it's largely incompetent, corrupt, biased, and a threat to America's national security.
01:54What were the procedures in place for you to make that determination? Specifically, how much staff was actually allocated to do that investigation to help you come to that conclusion?
02:04Well, we've got reports. We've got years of biased reporting. We have misused funds.
02:11Could you tell me about the step or the mechanisms that you use? How much staff was provided to look into it in those two weeks to get to that?
02:17How much staff is what?
02:18How much staff, like what was your mechanisms in actually going through coming to this conclusion within two weeks?
02:24Within two weeks, I assessed all of the grant agreements and I realized that these grant agreements had been changed during the Biden administration to take out any form of transparency.
02:35During the first Trump administration, the grants were written, the grant agreements were written where we had transparency.
02:41We could see what was being spent. And during the Biden administration, they took all of that transparency out.
02:46And then they signed a quarter of a billion dollar lease on a high rise building, saddling the American people with paying for it and it wasn't even equipped to do broadcasting.
02:56Well, I'm happy you mentioned transparency because that's what I'm trying to get also.
02:59Now, when you spoke to them or if you had anybody speak to them, was there a conversation for accountability and transparency?
03:05I think that's what we're trying to get to. What was the mechanisms in place to come to these conclusions? And before the lawsuit was filed and these letters were sent,
03:16was there anybody who went to them to ask questions and hold them accountable?
03:19It's really hard to have open communication when you're being sued.
03:23Well, before that, because we have letters back until April. This one was in June.
03:28So before any lawsuits were filed, were there any attempts to have that?
03:32I believe when I first got there, they reached out to me. I had just gotten in the building and said we'd like to meet.
03:38And before I even had the chance to clear my schedule and meet with them, they launched into malicious lawsuits.
03:45So no, we haven't met with them.
03:46If you can submit any communications that your office has had, I would greatly appreciate that.
03:50And my second question is, I do believe in lean, mean machines that work well.
03:55What are your matrices that you have in place to determine that the leanness is actually being beneficial
04:00and that this leanness is not creating a vacuum in which now we're not able to exercise our strongest power,
04:07which is our soft power, and our diplomacy?
04:10Well, it's one thing if it's used properly, but it hasn't been used properly.
04:14We laid out that the CCP has more say in what editorial content we have.
04:20I only have 43 seconds. I want to know what those matrices are.
04:23What are the points that you're using to determine that this is actually benefiting,
04:27like this machine is working versus adversely hurting us and creating a vacuum in which any other group can come in and put out propaganda?
04:36And we know there's a lot of propaganda, especially coming from the Internet.
04:39So I want to make sure that we actually have a plan in place, there's funding in place,
04:44or that there are matrices in place to determine that this lean creation of a machine is actually working for us and not against us.
04:51That's what our goal is. We want to make sure any information going out is not anti-American, is not pro-CCP.
04:56So if there is a matrices, could you please provide it to us so we could be on the same page?
05:00I wish we did have some say over what information was going out, but unfortunately, because of this firewall,
05:06this place could go totally rogue. This place could go and put 100% pro-CCP information.
05:11They could side with the regime in Iran, and we couldn't do a thing about it.
05:15They could run an attack piece on you.
05:17I understand. Thank you so much.
05:18And you couldn't do anything about it.
05:20The gentlelady's time has expired.
05:21I just want to take, if you can allocate me just one second so I can say this,
05:24because I think it's very important.
05:25The gentlelady had five minutes. Be brief.
05:27I thank you for being here, and this is really the objective of us working together and coming together and negotiating how can we move forward.
05:35Right now, we're at a critical juncture where we see more and more hostilities, especially in these areas.
05:40And so we want the answers to these questions so we can work together.
05:43Thank you. The gentlelady's time has really expired.
05:47The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Self.
05:52Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
05:55Based on the previous conversation on the security clearances, I want to go to Iran, back to Iran.
06:02In June of this year, you restarted broadcasts to Iran after Israel attacked them.
06:09In the meantime, Musk has said that the beams are on with Starlink into Iran.
06:16Industry estimates that there are 20,000 terminals, and you have to have a terminal yet.
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