Earlier this month, the BBC responded to the shutdown of USAID funds to one of its divisions with a brief statement:

Published: 4 February 2025 STATEMENT

A free press is essential to freedom and democracy – and 75% of countries around the world do not have a free press. BBC Media Action supports local media around the world to deliver trusted information to people most in need.

Like many international development organisations, BBC Media Action has been affected by the temporary pause in US government funding, which amounts to about 8% of our income in 2023-24. We’re doing everything we can to minimise the impact on our partners and the people we serve.

As the BBC’s international charity, we are completely separate from BBC News, and wholly reliant on our donors and supporters to carry out our work.

“Our statement on USAID funding”

Their CEO Simon Bishop followed up earlier this week:

● We support local media, and ensure people on the frontlines of conflict and crisis have access to trustworthy information. A free and trustworthy press is essential to freedom and democracy – and 75% of people around the world live in countries without a free press.

● We work in nearly 30 countries and in around 50 languages and we follow the editorial values and standards of the BBC.

● We rely solely on generous donors and supporters for funding to carry out our work. USAID has been one of these donors.

● All of our funding goes to our own projects. It is completely separate from the journalism of BBC News. We have no influence over the editorial decision-making of BBC News.

“Facts still matter,” February 11, 2025

The problem with this argument

My private opinion as a news hound: The U.S. government is not your average donor; neither would the British or Canadian government be. British government funding of a BBC foreign outreach is a defensible decision of statecraft. Other governments are meddling here.

An outreach of this sort is best funded by private philanthropists from various perspectives with an interest in media. Their political affiliations may be easy to guess but they might also be disparate. Maybe many could use a British tax receipt…

The Next Big Question is how the rise of user-generated news on social media impacts government efforts at censorship worldwide.

You may also wish to read: Politico strikes back against US government funding charge. Despite the angry denials, government data shows that key media outfits found a huge new source of income when Joe Biden took power in January 2021. Why?

Note: The featured image of the BBC headquarters is by Erru73 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0