Leaving the Front Lines, But Not the Fight

After decades of telling the story, I soon will begin work to protect the storytellers and try to help innovate 21st century journalism.

In my Substack post yesterday, I announced that soon I’ll retire from the Voice of America, reluctantly bringing to a close a 20+ year run as a correspondent in Asia before the past nine years based in Washington, DC (including at the State Department and the White House). For nearly the past three months I’ve been on paid administrative leave. That’s a status I now share with more than 1,300 of my VOA colleagues although barring some judicial miracle, nearly half of our staff (our contractors) are to be terminated “for convenience” a week from now.

It’s expected the majority of the remaining VOA staff will soon receive ‘RIF’ notices as our parent agency, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, in league with DOGE, destroys the pre-eminent external broadcaster of the United States, something our adversaries won’t able to do during VOA’s 83 years of continuous broadcasting (which was in nearly 50 languages until mid-March).

For months, I’ve been very public in speaking about this disaster, which our lawsuit contends is an illegal act, especially in terms of American soft power. I have refrained from commenting about larger press freedom issues and the fundamental challenges confronting journalism at home and abroad. Now, an opportunity has come my way that will allow me to work full-time on these wider matters.

As just announced by the University of Mississippi, following my retirement from the Foreign Service and VOA, in July I will become the inaugural executive director of the Jordan Center for Journalism Advocacy and Innovation. To say I’m thrilled to have this opportunity is an understatement.

I’ll have a lot more to say about this soon and I welcome your input.