NPR has been facing calls to be stripped of taxpayer cash following accusations of left-wing bias
NPR president, CEO duck House hearing on alleged bias: ‘National No-show Radio’
Fox News senior congressional correspondent Chad Pergram reports the latest on a House hearing on alleged bias at the tax-payer-funded public news outlet NPR.
FIRST ON FOX – An NPR correspondent repeatedly called for the law enforcement complex in America to be destroyed – believing it to be irreparably racist and beyond any reform.
Gene Demby is a correspondent who is focused on telling purportedly "Black Truths" at NPR's culture wing where he espouses leftist views, including that America is "a country that's built and defined by white supremacy." On his X account, where he calls himself "The LeBron James of Pig Feet," Demby expresses his most extreme ideologies, notably that police don't prevent crime and perpetuate "racist state violence."
"Abolition means *no* policing because policing is an inherently destructive force," he said in a June 2020 X post.
Demby made sure to point out that his perspective was more radical than activists who call for reform or to defund the police.
HOW NPR WENT ‘OFF THE RAILS’ TO KNEE-JERK LIBERALISM–ACCORDING TO A CURRENT TOP EDITOR
Gene Demby says at NPR he is involved in editing "essays and blog posts for team dedicated to coverage of issues of race and ethnicity." (Fox News Digital-Hannah Grossman | NPR)
"'Reform' is different from abolition because it's based on the idea that policing should exist, but simply modified – with more diverse police forces, with diff[erent] training, etc. But none of that interrupts the imperatives of policing," the NPR correspondent said in an August 2020 X post.
"There are people pushing for defunding [because] it rolls back policing and other people pushing for defunding [because] that's the practical way to abolition," Demby continued. "[The movement] IS abolish the police."
Demby said police have very little "vital function" in society.
"The police don't solve violent crimes effectively. They don't prevent crimes They don't de-escalate situations, and they put people in contact with the criminal justice system for being poor. How are they helpful? what vital function do they serve besides social control?" he continued in the same thread.
He went on to call the American public "racist."
"Every time the police have contact with Black people during some bulls--t traffic stop or some jumpy gentrifier calls 911, the prospect of state violence -- up to and including deadly force -- is on the table. The most direct way to keep Black folks from being killed by cops is to stop those unnecessary encounters. It takes off the table the bias in police imperatives, among individual officers, and among a racist public who use 911 like a customer service Hotline," he said in August 2020.
Demby responded to one user who said, "We must revoke the powers [the police] enjoyed, we've got to change all of the rules, all of it. From the ground up, NO POLICING. We don't need it."
"Right, that's what I'm saying," Demby responded in August 2020.
"Cops ain't protecting nobody *now*," he said in May 2021 to a "who will protect…" hypothetical.
Demby shared his left-wing views on police during the course of his affiliation with the taxpayer-funded NPR. His first byline appeared as early as 2012.
Fox News Digital contacted NPR for comment about the correspondent but did not immediately receive a response.
Demby leads NPR's Code Switch podcast team, which proclaims to be "the fearless conversations about race that you've been waiting for," according to its website. At NPR, he publishes stories on "whiteness" and "Imagining A World Without Prison."
His views about defunding the police state are more closely aligned with White Democrats than Black America, according to Pew research.
During the height of the discussion surrounding defunding the police, Pew research showed in 2021 that – by and large – Democratic Black Americans support increased funding for law enforcement – more so than White liberals.
KATHERINE MAHER'S PAST POLITICAL ACTIVITY FLIES IN THE FACE OF NPR'S ETHICS HANDBOOK
Defunding police is more popular among White Democrats than Black Democrats, according to 2021 Pew research during the height of the national debate. (Getty Images, iStock)
Only 25% of Black Americans polled supported reducing funding, and 36% wanted to keep status quo for police budgets, according to the research.
NPR, more broadly, has reportedly been struggling to connect to an audience, according to a report in the New York Times, which was causing a revenue problem.
"It is grappling with a declining audience and falling revenue — and internal conflict about how to fix it," Times reporters Benjamin Mullin and Jeremy Peters said.
The Times reporters noted that a "yearslong push to diversify NPR’s staff" hasn’t boosted listeners as much as executives hoped.
The report followed longtime NPR editor Uri Berliner blowing the whistle on alleged liberal bias at the organization with a piece in The Free Press. He ultimately resigned, proclaiming he "cannot work in a newsroom where I am disparaged by a new CEO whose divisive views confirm the very problems at NPR I cited."
The story thrust discussions of liberal bias at NPR into the national zeitgeist, and put a focus on CEO Katherine Maher, who has gone viral for past social media posts showing far-left personal views.
(Fox News Digital | Hannah Grossman)
On the note of defunding, Republicans have begun to call for NPR to be stripped of taxpayer dollars amid accusations those accusations of liberal bias.
"The government shouldn't be in the business of funding media, and it certainly shouldn't be funding media that has a clear bias," Rep. Bob Good, R-Va., who introduced a bill to defund NPR, said. NPR has had a clear left-wing bias for decades, and it's just growing by the day. And there's no reason for taxpayers to have to fund this."
While most of NPR’s funding comes from corporate sponsorships, according to its site, the nonprofit also benefits both directly and indirectly from federal funds. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which got a fiscal 2026 advance of $535 million in the latest government funding deal, oversees both NPR and the Public Broadcasting Service.
Fox News' Brian Flood, Elizabeth Elkind and Aubrie Spady contributed to this report.
Hannah Grossman is a Reporter at Fox News Digital.
