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How defunding public radio will affect rural towns

Cutting of public radio will hurt the people who voted for Trump; remote, rural, largely Republican voters.

A lot of the reporting on Trump’s budget says he’ll try to do away with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the nonprofit entity that helps fund over 1,500 locally owned and operated public TV and radio stations around the country.

Public radio is often associated with big-city liberalism, which makes it a constant target for defunding by Republicans, despite the fact that all public broadcasting put together represents only 0.01 percent of the federal budget. But cutting public radio could hurt the people who voted for Trump — remote, rural, largely Republican voters.

What happens when your only source of local news is your public radio station? VICE News’ Evan McMorris-Santoro visits a remote Alaska radio station to see what’s at stake.

This segment originally aired April 10, 2017, on VICE News Tonight on HBO.