On the tape, Betsy Liley, the director of institutional giving at NPR, tells a representative of the fictitious Muslim Education Action Center, a front for the notorious Muslim Brotherhood, that Soros has tried to subsidize NPR with as little fanfare as possible. Last week, Project Veritas released a tape proving that NPR was ready and willing to accept a $5 million donation from the faux jihadists and keep it anonymous.
In the latest tape, Liley explains that NPR took a lot of heat when Soros, a billionaire anti-Christian leftist who funds a constellation of anti-American groups, donated $1.8 million to NPR through his Open Society Foundations, the nerve center of his well-monied political apparatus. Soros is spending millions to attack conservatives through such leftist organizations as Media Matters For America, the goal of which is destroy conservative journalists.
Says Liley: “George Soros and the Open Society Institute gave us $1.8 million, and they have decided not to use on-air credits because of what’s happening in Congress.”
I think the first gift was within the first year he set up the Foundation, which was 10 or 15 years ago. But, it was a different political situation and current events were a little different, and so, it went through — I was not here, but I think it went — there wasn’t a press hullabaloo. I mean, the Open Society Institute was getting — you know, the conservatives on some of the websites, were having people call his foundation. The press was calling and so, it became, kind of — you know they got roped into the Juan Williams thing, which they didn’t feel like they needed to be.
The audio also reveals how “excited” NPR was about getting $5 million from the Muslim Education Action Center (MEAC), despite its questionable affiliations.
“I’m being very procedural here,” Liley says, “but we are excited about this and it’s very, very generous.”
After that, the MEAC representative, Kassam, explains why the group’s donation must be kept secret, again stressing the group’s connection to Islamic groups that sympathize with terrorism.
I can certainly understand … if they found that we were donating in particular, as I mentioned, some of our members are also parts of other groups that conservatives love to attack whether it’s the Muslim Brotherhood, or CAIR or the Muslim Students Association, etc…. If Glenn Beck found out these things… he would … well, it would probably be rather unfortunate for NPR in addition to us.
NPR Will Not Be Defunded
The tape is another black eye for NPR. During the past two weeks, O’Keefe released video and audio recordings that triggered a storm of criticism of NPR. The video shows a lunch meeting between two MEAC representatives, Liley, and NPR executive Ron Schiller. He calls Tea Party members stupid racists, and laughs with Liley when the Muslims say they call NPR “National Palestinian Radio” because its coverage of the Middle East is biased in favor of the anti-Israel Muslim cause.
The affiliation of the faux Muslims and the goal stated at their website, to spread Sharia or Islamic law throughout the world, did not bother the NPR executives.
That video resulted in Ron Schiller’s resignation and the firing of NPR CEO Vivian Schiller (no relation). She landed in hot water in October when she fired veteran NPR man Juan Williams and suggested he needed a psychiatrist because he admitted that Muslims on planes make him nervous.
Then O’Keefe released the first audio recording of Liley, in which she admits that she can keep the radical Muslim group’s identity a secret from auditors.
And now, O’Keefe has Liley confessing that Soros or the Soros spider-web of leftist organizations have been funding NPR for some time, long before he showered NPR with $1.8 million at about the same time Vivian Schiller permitted an executive to fire Williams over the phone.
Despite the controversy, NPR’s federal funding is safe. Hours after O’Keef’e released the latest from Liley, the U.S. House voted to defund NPR entirely. But according to the National Journal, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is one of its biggest fans and will block any attempt to cut off its federal funds.
“I listen to NPR every day,” Reid said in a statement issued on Thursday to National Journal Daily. “Like many Americans, my children and I have benefited from the educational and news programs public radio provides every day of the year. Public radio and the top-notch journalists it employs are valuable resources to people of all ages across the country and I can’t understand why Republicans would want to take that away from them.”
Republicans “want to take that away from them” because NPR’s programming, they say, is hopelessly leftist, an assessment with which at least one public radio executive agrees.
At a meeting of NPR’s board directors on February 25, Susan Schardt, executive director of the Association of Independents in Radio, said the network’s main target is rich white liberals, who constitute just 11 percent of the American population. She appealed to the board to broaden its horizons and make its programming palatable to most Americans.
Said Schardt, “We have to look at this because the criticisms that are coming at us — whether they’re couched in other things — do have some legitimacy. We must, as a starting point, take on board some of this criticism…. We have to own this.”
