Kirk Watson: “I had two amendments that I was going to offer on the Corporation of Public Broadcasting, and they have to do with…”

“I had two amendments that I was going to offer on the Corporation of Public Broadcasting, and they have to do with restricting funding for opening a new office that would monitor dissenting and ideological statements. Mr. Chairman, today I am offering an amendment that will help end the partisan attacks on public broadcasting by prohibiting the funding of the new Office of Ombudsmen at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The creation of such office is partisan, unnecessary, and contrary to the spirit of the law that created CPB, and I strongly urge my colleagues to support this amendment. Corporation of Public Broadcasting, CPB, Chairman, Kenneth Tomlinson, has inserted politics into our public media and has taken the public out. Recently we learned that Mr. Tomlinson secretly coordinated with a White House official to formulate ``guiding principles'' for the appointment of two partisan ombudsmen to monitor and critique all public broadcasting content. Furthermore, the ombudsmen were appointed by Tomlinson based on their purported political ideology--``one for the left and one for the right.'' These actions are in violation of the original mandate established by the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. This historic act forbids ``political or other tests'' from being used in employee actions and prohibits interference by Federal officials over public media content.…”