USAGM Watch Commentary In his latest op-ed in The Hill, former Voice of America (VOA) acting associate director Ted Lipien, who also served briefly in 2020-2021 as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) president, quotes his former VOA Polish Service colleague, Jewish-American writer Henryk Grynberg: “the president of a leading American university cannot apologize for her lack of basic human values”…
Why are US-funded USAGM journalists defending Russia, Iran over the Hamas massacre? – Ted Lipien Op-Ed in The Hill
My new op-ed in The Hill includes comments on the latest barbaric attacks by Hamas terrorists on Israeli civilians—defenseless Jewish women, children, and the elderly. I discuss the hard-to-understand and explain defense of propaganda and disinformation from Iran and Russia by U.S. government-managed and funded U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) journalists, including federal employees working for the Voice of America (VOA). They went…
Lech Walesa’s Nov. 15, 1989 speech in Congress was broadcast jointly by Voice of America and Polish Radio
Photograph of President George H.W. Bush and Lech Wałęsa was taken a day before Solidarity leader’s historic speech to the joint session of the United States Congress on November 15, 1989. The historic speech delivered on November 15, 1989 by Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa to the joint session of the United States Congress was broadcast to Poland in a joint…
LIPIEN: Remembering a Polish-American patriot
On September 1, 2010, The Washington Times published my article about Zofia Korbońska, an anti-Nazi and anti-Communist resister and a Voice of America Polish Service journalist who had passed away on August 16, 2010.
Fired Radio Liberty reporter Kristina Gorelik receives Moscow Helsinki Group Journalism Prize
BBG Watch Commentary Kristina Gorelik (Кристина Горелик), fired last September by American taxpayer-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) along with dozens of her colleagues, has received today the Moscow Helsinki Group prize for “journalistic activity aimed at promoting human rights values.” The prize was presented on the International Human Rights Day, December 10. At Radio Liberty, Gorelik specialized in human…
U.S. taxpayers funding pro-Putin VOA programs – Ted Lipien in Washington Examiner
Ted Lipien, a former Voice of America (VOA) acting associate director, has been warning for some time that marketing and staffing policies pushed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) executives have changed the focus of VOA and other BBG broadcasters from serious, accurate and well balanced journalism to ratings-chasing entertainment and sloppy reporting produced by inexperienced, poorly paid, otherwise…
Media freedom activist Ted Lipien warns against diminished public stake in U.S. international broadcasting
Republished from the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) website: In an article published in American Diplomacy, a quarterly electronic journal of commentary, analysis, and research on American foreign policy and its practice, the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) director Ted Lipien warns against diminished public stake in U.S. international broadcasting. Lipien, a former acting associate director of the…
Newly-formed Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting vows to defend media freedom journalism
BBG Watch has learned that individuals associated with U.S. human rights, labor, and media freedom organizations have formed the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB) with the aim of working with the Administration, Congress and media to promote free flow of uncensored news from the United States to countries in which journalists are threatened or lack sufficient resources. Many of…
Don’t silence Voice of America radio to China — Free Media Online president’s op-ed in The Washington Times
FreeMediaOnline.org Truckee, CA, USA, April 1, 2011– The Washington Times has published an op-ed by Free Media Online president Ted Lipien urging Congress to stop the Broadcasting Board of Governors from silencing the Voice of America radio to China. A Chinese free labor union leader like Poland’s Lech Walesa could be declared expendable by the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which…
The BBG-managed Voice of America (VOA) websites were hacked on February 21, 2011, apparently by the “Iranian Cyber Army,” as reported by PiratesWeek and Kim Andrew Elliott, a Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) employee who publishes his own private international broadcasting website, In 2009, VOA websites were out of comission for at least two full days during President Obama’s official…