Senator Joe Biden and his Defense of Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty

When Senator Joe Biden came to the defense of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty

N.Y. Times News Service November 1993

US - SENATORS BATTLE OVER FOREIGN BROADCAST CUTS

WASHINGTON; - A plan to consolidate U.S. international broadcasting operations, touted by the Clinton administration as a step toward streamlining the government, seems to be coming apart. 

The main element of the package presented last June by President Clinton envisioned combining the Voice of America with Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, the stations based in Munich that broadcast to the Soviet Union and its European satellites starting in the early 1950s. 

Under the plan, elimination of overlapping broadcasts and consolidation of transmitters and administrative staffs were seen as saving about $250 million over the next four years. 

The plan's hard-won compromise, placing the Munich stations under an independent broadcasting authority to be housed in the U.S. Information Agency, together with the Voice of America, also seemed to pacify a powerful conservative lobby bent on preserving Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty. 

But in a July hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Joseph R. Biden, D-Del., said that the Munich stations should remain "independent corporate entities." He also said a Radio Free Asia should be created as an independent station to broadcast to China, parallel to Voice of America. 

Administration officials say they are mystified by Biden's insistence on "independence" for the Munich stations and for a Radio Free Asia, which would still be federally financed under his proposals. 

Biden threatened to filibuster for the first time in his 20 years in the Senate, saying that if he is not satisfied, "I will go and make my case on the floor to knock out the whole reorganizational structure." At stake were not only the consolidation of government broadcasting operations, but also the entire Foreign Relations Authorization Act under which the State Department, as well as the U.S. Information Agency, are financed. 

The administration submitted a compromise proposal this week to Biden under which the Munich radios could keep their separate status, technically as private corporations receiving government financing. 

In an interview, Biden said: "It's resolved between the president and me. It is going exactly where I want it to go."