American Public Media Group, the nonprofit parent company of Minnesota Public Radio, announced Thursday that it will be reducing its staff as a result of recent government budget cuts to public broadcasting.
APMG plans to lay off 5% to 8% of its staff “in the coming weeks” and reduce employee benefits as it faces a more than $6 million budget deficit due to federal and state budget cuts, the St. Paul-based media company said in a statement.
“While we are fortunate among public media organizations to be in a relatively strong financial position, these are significant cuts,” Roycie Eppler, chief people and culture officer for APMG, said in the statement.
In a move spurred by the Trump administration, the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate last week rescinded $1.1 billion in already-approved funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in 2026 and 2027. That effectively fully defunded the organization that directs federal dollars to National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting System and some 1,500 local public radio and TV stations around the country, including Minnesota Public Radio.
Federal funding accounts for about 6% of MPR’s budget, the organization’s news division reported.
Minnesota lawmakers, aiming to tighten the new state budget, earlier this year also cut $1 million annually from MPR’s allocation for cultural heritage and legacy programming. That left the broadcaster with $2 million through June 2027, down from $4 million in the prior state budget, according to MPR News.
With a staff of approximately 500, 25 to 40 employees at APMG could soon lose their jobs. The company did not share details about which positions could be cut.
“We are working through details with care and respect and will continue to keep our team updated,” Eppler said.
APMG includes MPR and its news division; The Current, its contemporary music service; and YourClassical, its classical music service. It also includes American Public Media, which produces national public radio programming such as “Marketplace” and “The Splendid Table,” and Southern California Public Radio, a public radio network in the Los Angeles area.
Thursday’s announcement comes on the heels of layoffs at Twin Cities Public Television, the PBS station in Minneapolis-St. Paul, which was also impacted by the clawed-back federal funding. St. Paul-based TPT announced this week that it is laying off approximately 25 people across multiple departments.
The federal budget cuts are also expected to disrupt operations at four PBS outlets in greater Minnesota as well as other public radio stations outside the large MPR network, including Jazz88, community radio station KFAI and others.
“For nearly 60 years, public media has earned the support and trust of the American people as the country’s only local, no-cost, commercial-free, nonprofit news, information and culture service, resulting from a highly efficient public-private partnership,” Eppler said. “While we work through these financial challenges, we remain dedicated to our public service mission.”
The CPB, a private nonprofit, was created by bipartisan congressional approval in the 1960s. Trump administration officials tied the current funding cuts — which passed in both the Senate and House of Representatives on slim party-line margins — to an alleged left-leaning political bias within public media programming, though such concerns have not been well-substantiated by policymakers.
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