Democratic unity in the House on NPR bill sends strong signal, analyst says

Ross Baker, a political scientist at Rutgers University, has good news for NPR in Wednesday's (March 23) The Hill. The fact that all 185 voting Democrats last week rejected H.R. 1076, which would have banned federal funding to NPR, sends "a very powerful signal to the Senate and the White House," he says. "Anything that brings together Heath Shuler and Maxine Waters," Baker says, will gain notice from other Democratic leaders. Baker is referring to the centrist North Carolinian and liberal from California, respectively. The Hill said Republicans may take another stab at defunding pubcasting in an amendment to other measures, and similar language is included in a bill the House passed that would fund the government through September — a proposal Republican leaders want reconsidered when Congress returns next week, the paper noted.