NPR and PBS Face Tough Questions in Congress Hearing: Live Updates
In her opening remarks at Wednesday’s hearing on public media, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene accused PBS of using “taxpayer funds to push some of the most radical left positions like featuring a drag queen on the show.”
The Republican from Georgia pointed at a photo of Lil Miss Hot Mess, a drag queen, calling her a “monster.”
It was a line of attack that was somewhat expected by the chief executives of the biggest media networks in the United States. Ms. Greene had shared a video on social media before the hearing that included a clip from a “PBS NewsHour” segment about drag queens.
But Lil Miss Hot Mess was never featured on PBS’s children’s programming, according to Paula Kerger, the chief executive of PBS who testified on Wednesday. Instead, she was featured in a project from the WNET Group, the parent company of New York’s public television stations, in conjunction with the New York City Department of Education.
“The drag queen was actually not on any of our kids’ shows,” Ms. Kerger responded when Representative William Timmons, Republican of South Carolina, asked her if she thought it was “inappropriate to put the drag queen on the kids’ show.”
The image the chairwoman showed, Ms. Kerger said, was from a digital segment.
The segment, which is part of a YouTube video series called “Let’s Learn,” now opens with a statement, dated May 24, 2021, that notes the partnership between the WNET group and the New York City Department of Education. The statement also says that the series was not funded or distributed by PBS.
“It was not for PBS,” Ms. Kerger said in response to Mr. Timmons. The video was mistakenly put on our website by our New York City station, she said, but it was not intended for a national distribution, nor was it ever aired on PBS.
In her closing statement, Ms. Greene showed a video of Lil Miss Hot Mess reading her book, “The Hips on the Drag Queen Go Swish, Swish, Swish.”
“That’s repulsive, that’s not what children ages 3 to 8 should ever be watching,” she said.
