Tangle - Congress claws back $9 billion in spending.

Episode Date: July 24, 2025

On Thursday, the Senate voted 51–48 to pass a rescissions package clawing back $9 billion in federal funding that had previously been approved for international aid and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). The next day, the House approved the package 216–213, sending it to President Donald Trump, who has yet to sign the bill. Tangle LIVE tickets are available!Today we’re excited to announce that our third installment of Tangle Live will be held on October 24, 2025, at the Irvine Barclay Theatre in Irvine, California. If you’re in the area (or want to make the trip), we’d love to have you join Isaac and the team for a night of spirited discussion, live Q&A, and opportunities to meet the team in person. You can read more about the event and purchase tickets here.Ad-free podcasts are here! Tangle LIVE tickets are available!Many listeners have been asking for an ad-free version of this podcast that they could subscribe to — and we finally launched it. You can go to ReadTangle.com to sign up!You can read today's podcast⁠ ⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠, our “Under the Radar” story ⁠here and today’s “Have a nice day” story ⁠here⁠.Take the survey: How would you describe Russia’s role in the 2016 presidential election? Let us know!Disagree? That's okay. My opinion is just one of many. Write in and let us know why, and we'll consider publishing your feedback.You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here. Our Executive Editor and Founder is Isaac Saul. Our Executive Producer is Jon Lall.This podcast was written by: Isaac Saul and edited and engineered by Jon Lall. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75.Our newsletter is edited by Managing Editor Ari Weitzman, Senior Editor Will Kaback, Lindsey Knuth, Kendall White, Bailey Saul, and Audrey Moorehead.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode is sponsored by the OCS Summer Pre-Roll Sale. Sometimes when you roll your own joint, things can turn out a little differently than what you expected. Maybe it's a little too loose. Maybe it's a little too flimsy. Or maybe it's a little too covered in dirt because your best friend distracted you and you dropped it on the ground. There's a million ways to roll a joint wrong.

But there's one roll that's always perfect. The pre-roll. Shop the Summer Pre-roll and infuse pre-roll sale today at ocs.ca and participating retailers. Say hello savings and goodbye worries with Freedom Mobile. Get 60 gigs to use in Canada, the US, and Mexico for just 39 bucks a month. Plus get a one-time use of five gigs of Roam Beyond data. Conditions apply, details at freedommobile.ca.

Audible invites you to listen for the thrill. Conditions apply. Details at freedommobile.ca. like Onyx Storm or Amelia Hart's The Sirens. Audible has an incredible selection of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals all in one app. Start listening and discover what's beyond the edge of your seat when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.ca. From executive producer, Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening. And welcome to the Tangle podcast, the place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Saul. And today, you're not getting much of me today, actually. Ari Weitzman, our managing editor, wrote today's My Take, which I'm super excited about.

I was actually on the Breaking Points podcast this morning, which took up a good bit of my time. So I called in a sub on the take. If you're a fan of Breaking Points, you'll hear me over there. And if not, you should go check it out. It's a great independent podcast with diversity of perspectives.

So, you know, I respect what they're doing. And it was really fun to go on. We talked about the Tulsi Gabbard releases and some of what we learned. And I think it was a pretty fun segment. So I highly recommend checking it out. Before I jump in to the podcast today and pass it over to John and Ari, I have a big announcement. A couple of years ago, we launched our Tangle live event series, which has taken Tangle on the road

to discuss hot button issues with commentators from across the political spectrum. We have hosted live events in New York and Philadelphia. And today we are excited to announce that our third installment of Tangled Live is going to be held on October 24th, 2025 at the Irvine Barclay Theater in Irvine, California. So we're coming to Southern California. We're coming to the West coast by popular demand. If you are in the area or want to make the trip, I would love to have you join me and the team for a night of spirited discussion, live Q&A, opportunities to meet the team in person. We have information about the event and a link to purchase tickets. This is a 700 person room. It's a big theater.

We want to sell it out. So please go to the episode description and go to our website and buy those tickets. This year, I am thrilled to announce our most star studded lineup of guests yet. First of all, I'm going to be joined on stage by Camille Foster, our new editor at large. You guys have all gotten to know, super excited about that. Also Alex Thompson, Axios' national political correspondent and the co-author of the New York Times number one bestseller Original Sin about Joe Biden and the 2024 presidential election, and Anna Kasparian, the executive producer and host of The Young Turks, and a reporter for Real Clear Investigations.

We are in the process of booking a fifth panelist, including me, your host, and we'll be announcing them in the near future. The ink isn't quite dry on that contract, but I'm very excited for that as well. So please consider joining us October 24th, 2025 at the Irvine Barclay Theater in Irvine, California. It is going to be awesome and we'll see you guys there. All right. With that, I'm going to send it over to John for today's main topic and I'll be back for a brief celebrity appearance in the reader question. ["The Daily Show Theme Song"] Thanks, Isaac, and welcome, everybody. Here are your quick hits for today.

First up, the Justice Department reportedly informed President Donald Trump earlier this year that his name appeared several times in documents related to Jeffrey Epstein. At the time, Attorney General Pam Bondi also informed the president that they would not publicly release additional documents because some contained child pornography and victims' personal information. Separately, a federal judge denied a Justice Department request to unseal grand jury records

regarding federal investigations into Epstein, finding that the government had failed to justify the need for the release. Number 2. President Trump announced a $221 million settlement with Columbia University to resolve ongoing federal civil rights investigations into the school for alleged discriminatory practices. The agreement restores the school's federal research funding and imposes oversight through an independent monitor Number three director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard released new documents related to investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 election

Which she claims showed that intelligence agencies relied on faulty information to conclude that Russia sought to boost then candidate Trump's Candidacy the Justice Department also announced the formation of a strike force to assess the documents Gabbard publicized. Number four, protests continued in Ukraine over a new law that heightens government oversight of two anti-corruption agencies. Critics say the law undermines those agencies' independence. And number five, the Supreme Court ruled in an unsigned order that President Trump can remove three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission while a legal challenge

to their removal plays out in court. Separately, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled two to one that President Trump's executive order on birthright citizenship cannot go into effect in any states, finding that four Democratic-led states challenging the order were entitled to a nationwide injunction. The House will soon take up the package of spending cuts that the Senate approved overnight. In the cuts, it funding, for funding I should say say for foreign aid and PBS as well as NPR.

The bill is amended as passed. Overnight senators voted 51 to 48 to slash around nine billion dollars worth of previously approved funding for foreign aid and public broadcasting. Republicans Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins joined with Democrats to oppose the measure, sounding the alarm over the impact to local public radio and TV stations. On Thursday, the Senate voted 51 to 48 to pass a rescissions package clawing back $9 billion in federal funding that had previously been approved for international aid and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds National

Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service. The next day, the House approved the package 216-213, sending it to President Donald Trump, who has yet to sign the bill. For context, rescissions cancel funds already appropriated by Congress. In May, President Trump and Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vaught requested 22 rescissions of budget authority, totaling $9.4 billion under the Congressional Budget and Empoundment Control Act of 1974. This law allows the President to propose rescissions, which Congress has 45 days to approve before

the money must be spent as originally allocated. The final version of the package clawed back roughly $7.9 billion from foreign aid and $1.1 billion for public broadcasting, but the Senate struck a $400 million requested cut to the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a global AIDS program, after Republican senators raised concerns. However, the final package codified many of the key cuts to foreign assistance programs recommended by the Department of Government Efficiency early in Trump's term, particularly to the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID.

OMB Director Vought said the White House would likely send additional rescission packages to Congress after their August recess. The package passed both chambers, largely along party lines, with most Republicans in favor and all Democrats opposed. Senate Majority Leader John Thune called the measure, a small but important step toward fiscal sanity that we should all be able to agree is long overdue. Democrats strongly criticized the cuts. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer suggested that they imperiled future bipartisan lawmaking,

accusing Republicans of retreating to a back room to rubber-stamp President Trump's purely partisan scheme that only needs a simple majority to pass to tear up previous arguments. A small number of Republicans also objected to the cuts. Senator Susan Collins, who voted against the package, suggested the White House had not provided sufficient detail to support its recommendations. NPR and PBS leaders warned that the cuts would immediately impact their stations. PBS president and CEO Paula Kuerger said in a statement, many of our stations which provide access to free, unique local programming and emergency alerts will now be forced to make hard decisions in the weeks and months ahead.

Today, we'll share arguments from the right and the left about the rescission's package, and then Ari's take. We'll be right back after this quick break. This episode is sponsored by the OCS Summer Pre-Roll Sale. Sometimes, when you roll your own joint, things can turn out a little differently than what you expected. Maybe it's a little too loose. Maybe it's a little too flimsy. Or maybe it's a little too covered in dirt because your best friend distracted you when

you dropped it on the ground. There's a million ways to roll a joint wrong, but there's one roll that's always perfect. The pre-roll. Shop the summer pre-roll and infuse pre-roll sale today at ocs.ca and participating retailers. Say hello savings and goodbye worries with Freedom Mobile. Get 60 gigs to use in Canada, the US, and Mexico for just 39 bucks a month. Plus get a one-time use of 5 gigs of Roam Beyond data. Conditions apply, details at freedommobile.ca. All right, first up, let's start with what the rate is saying. The rate supports the cuts, particularly to NPR and PBS. Some say the rescissions package is a first step to bringing down the national debt.

Others refute the claim that public broadcasting cuts harm-free speech. In USA Today, Nicole Russell wrote, PBS and PR push liberal propaganda. Trump is right to cut their funding. NPR and PBS were once one-stop shops for news and wholesome programs for families. The kids could watch Sesame Street while the parents listened to all things considered. But now, NPR, and to a lesser extent PBS, have become a cesspool of liberal bias that taxpayers have been forced to fund, Russell said. NPR often frames its news coverage in ways that make Trump's conservative policies seem

harmful rather than simply reporting the facts. A progressive point of view is fine when presented as commentary, but NPR purports to be a neutral news source that serves all Americans. Don't believe me? Allsides, a media literacy organization that rates news organizations' biases, has repeatedly found that NPR's online content leans left, Russell wrote. The calls about NPR's leftist bias have come from inside the House. Longtime business editor Yuri Berliner famously resigned last year after being suspended for

publicly detailing his employer's history of newsroom bias. Taxpayers shouldn't be forced to financially support a news source that's so blatantly partisan. In Newsweek, Eric Erickson said the rescissions package will help Republicans prove they're serious about the national debt. The national debt is an existential threat. The CBO estimates that net interest payments are projected to hit $1 trillion next year, crowding out investments in defense, infrastructure, and taxpayer relief, Erickson wrote.

Every dollar spent on questionable programs, say for example the 10 million dollars set aside for gender programs in Pakistan that somehow found its way into the domestic COVID relief bill, is a dollar stolen from future generations. The Recisions Act, through its modest 0.5% of discretionary spending, is a critical signal to voters and the market. It is time for Congress to reassert its role as the legislature, rather than outsource its responsibilities to the executive branch. Elon Musk and Doge did an admirable job from the White House in flagging $162 billion in improper payments in 2024 alone.

Recisions are a constitutional path to codify these savings, shielding the administration from legal challenges while reasserting Congress' fiscal responsibility, Erickson said. Republicans should make liberals justify their own spendthrift ways rather than playing defense. The rescissions act as a test of whether the GOP can follow the mandate that voters gave them in 2024. In National Review, Dan McLaughlin argued, defunding NPR is no threat to free speech. There are certainly sound reasons to be worried that the Trump administration is abusing its

powers to retaliate against critics in some areas, such as targeting entire law firms just because they previously employed an enemy of Trump. But the specific case of NPR just doesn't belong in this discussion, McLaughlin wrote. National Public Radio's budget is being cut by Congress, not by executive action. Long-standing precedents set a very high bar for First Amendment claims of viewpoint discrimination and retaliation when those decisions are made on a facially neutral bias by a legislature. Of course, it's true in a sense that defunding NPR isn't facially neutral because Congress didn't at the same time defund federally taxpayer-funded conservative media outlets.

That's because there are none to defund, McLaughlin said. Which brings us to the broader cultural point. So long as NPR is publicly funded, its speech is not free speech in the way we think of individual liberty. It is government speech. Claiming a First Amendment right or even free speech cultural value for the left to retain a permanent claim to taxpayer subsidies for one viewpoint is an argument that dissolves on close inspection. Alright, that is it for what the right is saying, which brings us to what the left is saying. The left opposes the package, arguing that it's what the right is saying, which brings us to what the left is saying. The left opposes the package, arguing that it's founded on false pretenses.

Some say the cuts will cause Democrats to lose trust in Republicans during upcoming appropriations. Others note the public broadcasting cuts are part of a long-standing conservative campaign against public media. In Slate, Natesh Pawar called the public broadcasting cuts ridiculous. Historically, Republicans from states with significant rural and indigenous populations have often fought to preserve and even expand public media funds, even when other GOP legislators oppose such efforts, Pawar said.

This time, Senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski were the only real GOP holdouts. What changed for their colleagues, then? There are two main factors here. A years-long culture war campaign to reduce Americans' trust in NPR and PBS, and the far-right Heritage Foundation's successful effort to install the architects of its Project 2025 agenda in the White House. For pundits and members of Congress to decry CPB as some leftist indoctrination factory is laughable. The corporation has multiple Republican board members, including current president and CEO Patricia Harrison, a George W. Bush appointee, Pawaw wrote. This is not the end of public media,

to be clear. At least three dozen states also provide direct monetary support for local public broadcasting stations. And there are other nonprofit groups not backed by the federal government. Still, the local and national media ecosystems will suffer a steep injury and there will be a far narrower range of programming and opportunities than before. For the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Devin O'Connor, Sam Berger, and Jacob Liebenluft suggested the rescissions package undermines future funding deals. Congressional approval of the administration proposal would mark the first successful presidential proposed rescissions under the ICA authority

since fiscal year 1999, and the largest such rescissions enacted over four decades. Under normal circumstances, weighing the potential harm from the proposed cuts against the cost savings might be the only consideration, the authors wrote. But this rescission package did not come to Congress under normal circumstances. The administration illegally impounded the funds at issue for months before proposing the package. Enacting appropriations for fiscal year 2026, which starts October 1st, will require Democratic senators to join with Republicans to reach the needed 60-vote threshold. This Democratic support may not materialize if Democrats are concerned that any argument

could later be undone if the administration proposes a rescission package under the ICA that at least 50 Republican senators agree to, the author said. As a result, it would be far more difficult to reach the bipartisan agreements necessary to fund the government on time. In the New York Times, Jim Ruttenberg wrote, conservatives get the PBS and NPR cuts they've wanted for decades. For five decades, Republicans failed time and again to choke off federal funding for public broadcasting.

Some were afraid of being accused of avicide, for killing Big Bird of Sesame Street, while others appreciated their local public stations and the airtime they personally received. Always stopping the party short of turning their threats against PPS and NPR into law, Ruttenberg said. That they have finally been able to do it now, on one level speaks to the power of President Trump. His threat to support primary challenges against any Republicans who might try to block the cuts all but guaranteed this would go through this time.

The ascendant ideology of the Trump era is the opposite of the one that spawned the modern public broadcast system. Its creation was spurred along by the declaration of Newton and Minow, chairman of the FCC during the Kennedy administration, that the competition for ratings and Minow, chairman of the FCC during the Kennedy administration, that the competition for ratings and ad dollars has turned television into a vast wasteland, Ruttenberg wrote. Those commercial forces still exist in an era of social media program algorithms that reward content that attracts the most likes and shares.

That's rarely the hyper-local issues or deep policy discussions that are the bread and butter of local public broadcast television and radio stations. All right, let's head over to Ari for his take. Hey, managing editor Ari Weitzman here with a take for today saying that is it for what the left and the right are saying and I'm gonna give you my take now. So earlier this year when I stepped in for Isaac when he was out on paternity leave the legality of the executive branch under spending the federal budget I think was the defining subject of the takes that I authored at the time. I never expected this issue would disappear when Isaac came back in fact I

was certain that President Trump's attempt to cut the existing federal the time. I never expected this issue would disappear when Isaac came back. In fact, I was certain that President Trump's attempt to cut the existing federal budget had only just begun. In our January 30th edition on the federal funding freeze, I wrote, keep an eye out for a new debate over the constitutional limits of executive power, with the keywords deferral and rescission. I also wrote that Trump was not being a king, but probing the limits of his executive power in ways that other presidents have done, in ways they haven't. I also wrote the courts would not approve of the executive branch cutting spending unilaterally,

and that the Republican-controlled Congress was likely to pursue rescission. And that's exactly what's happening now. For all the grief I've given this Congress since Trump's inauguration for ceding its power to the executive branch, I have to credit them here for actually exercising their power of the person doing something to address the deficit. They're not relying on Elon Musk to try to do their job for them. They're cutting nine billion dollars of federal spending. Nine billion is a significant amount of money and a legal step towards addressing our federal deficit. Yes, it's an unusual step, so unusual that a legal expert I had

talked to about Doge wasn't even familiar with what rescission was at the time and Congress hasn't approved a rescission request since 1999, but it is a legal step forward nonetheless. And while I am happy about that, I still think Congress' baby step forward is just a big stumble for a couple of reasons. First, the cuts themselves. I'm open to the idea of USAID being directed by the State Department for diplomatic purposes, and I'm also personally innately uncomfortable with the idea of the government sponsoring any media, which does invite politicization by its very structure, so I'm not ideologically opposed to rolling back

federal funding there either. But the specific items this package is cutting, the Africa Corps, international development assistance, disaster relief, these aren't woke nonsense, and the much touted quote transition initiatives in the package make up 0.6% of all the rescinded spending. Instead in turning away from these programs, the government is abdicating US leadership on the global developmental stage, creating a vacuum for other countries to fill like China who is eagerly trying to fill that vacuum right now. Meanwhile, I want to be surprised if the public broadcasting cuts totally backfire. Nationally syndicated programming like This American Life

or All Things Considered are funded independently by grants, direct donations, and local stations purchasing broadcasting rights. More likely than not, those shows will continue to exist. Instead, smaller and underfunded stations will be hampered by not being able to purchase the rights to those shows, or by cunning staffing, or potentially by closing down entirely. It's not Terry Gross who's going to lose her job, but the reporter on the ground in the state capitol. And I know some NPR reporters do that work. They perform a valuable function in communities all across the country. Furthermore, given that most of the threatened stations tend to be in rural states that vote

Republican, canceling their funding may end up hurting constituents more than fire them up. The GOP has recognized this in the past and actually done a lot to support public broadcasting. Past recipients of the Champion of Public Broadcasting award include reliable conservatives such as Senator Shelley Moor Capito in West Virginia, Representative Mike Simpson of Idaho, and Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma. So doing this could drive more listeners to conservative talk radio in the short term, but it may not be a wise political move in the long term. Second are the legal and organizational issues. Before requesting that Congress rescind funding for public broadcasting and international

aid, Trump and the Office of Management and Budget impounded funds for foreign aid unilaterally in January, without Congress, a process that federal courts ruled unconstitutional at the time and affirmed as such in March. Not only that, but the process was incredibly disorganized. OMB released a memo that called on agencies to freeze about $3 trillion in federal spending, including Medicare payments, then rescinded the memo, but not the funding freeze, which the press secretary told us should clear up the confusion. It did not. And now, even though Trump is taking the legal route through Congress, I still found myself pretty confused.

According to the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, Congress has 45 days to improve a president's rescission request. That means that Congress had until July 18th to meet the deadline, which they did just under the wire. However, Trump still hasn't signed the rescission package. Why? We can speculate, but we don't know. And the White House hasn't said.

Lastly, these cuts aren't going to provide any meaningful reduction to the deficit. Tangle has been a broken record on this point, but we'll say it again. The four biggest areas of government spending are healthcare, social security, servicing the national debt, and the military. Without cuts in those areas, we have no chance to actually close the federal deficit and shrink the national debt. Of course, we could always consider raising revenue through taxes, but that path is a non-starter under this administration.

Not only that, but Congress just passed a bill that will simultaneously lower revenue and increase costs, adding a projected $3 trillion to the national debt over the next 10 years. So Congress just has to make similar clawbacks to this one 332 more times just to fix the damage they've already inflicted. So this is technically progress, and I suppose that's worthy of some recognition, but these savings are totally eclipsed by the deficit increase Congress has already approved, they're cutting the wrong things, and they still haven't gotten their bill signed by the same president

who requested it. Plenty of Republican members have kicked and screamed along the way, but at some point they're going to have to do the brave thing and address our fiscal situation with some lasting austerity. We'll be right back after this quick break. This episode is sponsored by the OCS Summer Pre-Roll Sale. Sometimes when you roll your own joint, things can turn out a little differently than what you expected. Maybe it's a little too loose. Maybe it's a little too flimsy.

Or maybe it's a little too covered in dirt because your best friend distracted you and you dropped it on the ground. There's a million ways to roll a joint wrong, but there's one roll that's always perfect. The pre-roll. Shop the summer pre-roll and infuse pre-roll sale today at ocs.ca and participating retailers. Say hello savings and goodbye worries with Freedom Mobile. Get 60 gigs to use in Canada, the US, and Mexico for just 39 bucks a month.

Plus get a one-time use of five gigs of Roam Beyond data. Conditions apply, details at freedommobile.ca. All right. That's it for my take, which brings us to your questions answered. Today's question comes from Jasmine from San Bruno, California, who asks, what's the deal with the CBS protest happening? Did CBS do anything questionable? The protests that CBS right now are in reaction to the network's decision to cancel the late show with Stephen Colbert. Critics of the move say it was political, and that CBS's parent company, Paramount, is folding to pressure from the Trump administration, either real or implied, to silence criticisms. Our editorial staff responded to the basic question, did CBS do anything questionable here? Is the cancellation of Stephen Colbert's show in any way political?

So we're going to go through each staff member, but me, Ari Weitzman, managing editor, I'm going to start. CBS is certainly within their rights to cancel one of their programs, especially one that was reportedly cashflow negative to the tune of several million dollars. And there is some smoke here since CBS's parent company Paramount Global recently settled with Trump for 16 million dollars. However, I don't think there's any real fire. Remember, Paramount owns Comedy Central, which airs The Daily Show as well as South Park, which was pretty brutal in their opening season premiere towards Trump. So I don't think they're silencing dissent here.

Instead, I think CBS is just asking what the point of these late shows is in a world where celebrities are easily accessible. I'm Audrey Moorhead, associate editor for Tangle. I think CBS just needed to tighten up the budget. The Late Show was losing money, and even if it led in its time slot, late night talk shows are a dying format, so Colbert went to the chopping block. That Colbert's cancellation would also please the president with the power to sink their merger probably made the executive's decision easier, but I don't think it was the sole or even a primary factor.

Hi, this is senior editor Will Kabeck, and here's my response. This decision was likely political, but not exclusively so. Now it's no secret that Paramount, which owns CBS, is courting President Trump's favor as it pursues a high stakes merger with Skydance Media. In fact, canceling Colbert is arguably the least shameless of the company's recent parade of panders to the White House. But regardless of your politics, such a brazen pursuit of a quid pro quo deal should feel a little bit grimy. At the same time, I think canceling Colbert is also a straightforward financial decision, in the sense that the

show was reportedly losing $40 million a year, and canceling it would also boost the odds of reaching a lucrative deal. It feels craven, but I do think Paramount is ultimately just making a financial decision. Hi, I'm Lindsay. I'm an associate editor at Tangle, and like most of the country, I don't actually watch late night, but I've always thought of it as an untouchable, firmly-escanced species in America's media ecosystem. This CBS saga did show me how imperiled it really is, but I still don't buy that the motives are purely financial.

CBS's parent company Paramount, it breaks in almost $30 billion per year, and it has just signed on to two deals that personally benefit the president. So while a million factors do underlie media decisions like this, one of those factors does seem to be meeting the current political moment. All right. This is Isaac Saul, your executive editor. Here's how I would answer this question. Imagine being in a relationship.

You know it's going nowhere, but it satisfies some part of your social life. It gets a lot easier to leave the relationship when someone else you like enters the picture and they might like you back. I think that's basically what's happening here. I doubt Paramount made this decision purely in pursuit of their merger. Much more likely to me is that they saw an opportunity to make a justifiable financial decision now rather than later that could double as an investment in a good relationship with the current administration. All we can do is speculate, but I doubt the decision was purely financial or purely political.

I know that's not a satisfying answer, but it is my honest answer. All right. With that, I'm going to send it back to John for the rest of the pod. And I'm going to see you guys tomorrow. Thanks, Isaac. Here's your under the radar story for today, folks. This week, Pew Research released new polling that shows rising support among US adults for banning middle and high school students from using cell phones during class.

Since Pew's survey last fall, support for phone bands in class has risen from 68% to 74%, while support for bands throughout the entire school day has risen from 36% to 44%. The increase is particularly pronounced among younger adults. 57% of those aged 18 to 29 said they support in-class bands, up from 45% in 2024. The survey findings come as several states and Congress have ramped up efforts to pass cell phone bans over concerns about the device's impact on students' behaviors, social skills, and academic performance. Pew Research has this story and there's a link in today's episode description. All right, next up is our numbers section.

The total amount of rescissions requested by the president between Gerald Ford's administration, which started in 1974, and the first Trump administration is $91.9 billion. Of those requests, the total amount of rescissions approved by Congress is $25.1 billion. The amount of rescissions requested by President Donald Trump in his first term is $25.1 billion. The amount of rescissions requested by President Donald Trump in his first term was $14.8 billion. The amount of those requests accepted by Congress was $0. According to a March 2025 Pew Research poll, 43% of U.S. adults say Congress should continue to fund NPR and PBS, while 24% say they should remove federal funding. 20% of U.S. adults say they regularly get their news from NPR, while 21% say they regularly get

their news from PBS. 9% of Republicans say they regularly get their news from NPR, while 32% of Democrats say they regularly get their news from NPR. 11% of Republicans say they regularly get their news from PBS, and 31% of Republicans say they regularly get their news from PBS, and 31% of Democrats say they regularly get their news from PBS. And last but not least, our Have a Nice Day story. Malaria kills about 597,000 people per year, and most of those deaths are concentrated among children under 5 years old in Africa, where the disease is endemic in many areas.

Newborns are the most vulnerable population, as they cannot be vaccinated against malaria until they are 5 months old or risk serious side effects. Now, however, help could be on the way. Swissmedic, Switzerland's drug regulator, recently approved the world's first malaria treatment for newborn babies. The medicine modifies existing treatments to prevent side effects and can be dissolved in breast milk to make it easier to give to patients. Eight African countries are expected to quickly approve the medicine as part of a partnership with Swissmedic. Euronews has this story and there's a link in today's episode description.

has this story and there's a link in today's episode description. All right everybody that is it for today's episode. As always if you'd like to support our work please go to readtangle.com where you can sign up for a newsletter membership, podcast membership, or a bundled membership that gets you a discount on both. As Isaac mentioned at the top tickets are now on sale for our Tangle Live event happening in Irvine, California at the Barclay Theatre on October 24th. If you're in the area or you want to take a great trip, we'd love to have you join us for a spirited discussion, live Q&A, and opportunities to meet the team, including me. We're thrilled to have our very own editor-at-large, Camille Foster, as well as Alex Thompson and

Anna Kasparian as our current guests. We are working on a fifth panelist that we plan to announce in the near future. In the meantime, there is a link in today's episode description where you can purchase tickets. There's also a link in today's newsletter. Isaac Ari and Camille will be here with the Sunday podcast, and I will return on Monday. For the rest of the crew, this is John Law signing off. Have an absolutely wonderful weekend, y'all. Peace.

Our executive editor and founder is me, Isaac Saul, and our executive producer is John Law. Today's episode was edited and engineered by John Law. Our editorial staff is led by managing editor Ari Weitzman with senior editor Will Kavak and associate editors Audrey Morehead, Bailey Saul, Lindsay Knuth, and Kendall White. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75 and John Law. And to learn more about Tangle and to sign up for a membership, please visit our website at reedtangle.com. This episode is sponsored by the OCS Summer Pre-Roll Sale. Sometimes when you roll your own joint, things can turn out a little differently than what you expected.

Maybe it's a little too loose, maybe it's a little too flimsy. Or maybe it's a little too covered in dirt because your best friend distracted you when you dropped it on the ground. There's a million ways to roll a joint wrong. But there's one roll that's always perfect. The pre-roll. Shop the summer pre-roll and infuse pre-roll sale today at ocs.ca and participating retailers. Say hello savings and goodbye worries with Freedom Mobile. sale today at OCS.ca and participating retailers. for the thrill. Escape the everyday with stories that leave you breathless. Whether it's heart-pounding suspense like the Audible Originals 10 Rules for the Perfect Murder by James Patterson,

or the downloaded with Brendan Fraser, or how about a fantasy adventure like Onyx Storm, or Amelia Hart's The Sirens. Audible has an incredible selection of audiobooks, podcasts, and originals all in one app. Start listening and discover what's beyond the edge of your seat when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.ca.