Kari Lake Isn’t Telling the Truth About the VOA
Former broadcaster Kari Lake, an advisor to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, recently posted a video on social media platform X criticizing the agency’s lease of a new Washington headquarters stating it was an unnecessary and costly burden on taxpayers. Photo by Getty Images
Wall Street Journal
President Trump recently selected Kari Lake as his top adviser to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America, the country’s biggest international broadcaster. On March 14 she tweeted—and Elon Musk retweeted—a blistering video from USAGM’s new headquarters in Washington. “I’m horrified by some of the things I’m learning about this agency,” she says. “I’m sitting here on the 13th floor of a shiny, brand-new, beautiful skyscraper building that is costing you, the taxpayer, a fortune.” Officials from the Biden administration, she said, had just signed a 15-year lease on this building “that’s going to cost the taxpayer nearly a quarter of a billion dollars.” Shortly after she tweeted, USAGM pulled out of the lease.
Ms. Lake counted 26 conference rooms. Italian marble. Leather furnishings. Waterfalls. “All of this being paid for by the American taxpayer!” The tweet was flooded with outraged comments. And why not? I would have been outraged too—if the story she told were true.
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