Dina Titus Presses Agency For Global Media CEO On Language Expansion

2 months ago

On Tuesday, Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) questioned the U.S. Agency for Global Media CEO Amanda Bennett on languages used by the agency during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing.

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00:00And, sir, we answered these questions many times, including with seven transcribed interviews

00:05by all the people involved.

00:06I'm just asking if you could answer on the record whether she has a Ph.D. or not.

00:10That's not a private question, and I think that was part of the gentleman's inquiry.

00:15I think I need to defer to the testimonies that have been given by our people under—

00:20Then let the record show that she did not have it and that those were truthful, that

00:24she had lied about it, and we'll leave it that way unless we get something different

00:28from a witness.

00:29With that, we go to the gentlelady from Nevada, Ms. Titus, for her five minutes.

00:34Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

00:35I would like to talk about some of the languages that you include and some that you don't.

00:41I've worked a lot with the Appropriations Committee to highlight the importance of including

00:46Mongolian language.

00:49There are nine million Mongolians out there that are in Mongolia, in Russia, in the People's

00:55Republic of China, and we're just not reaching them.

00:58And yet, Mongolia is a neighbor that we need in a kind of unfriendly part of the world.

01:05They have an opportunity to do independent foreign policy.

01:08They are leaning towards the West and democracy.

01:11We need to get information they have, and they need to hear from us.

01:16I wonder, Ms. Bennett, can you talk about what steps you've taken to try to establish

01:20a Mongolian language service?

01:23There's a Mongolian caucus here in Congress that would be interested in hearing about

01:28that.

01:29Congresswoman, I completely agree with you as to the importance of the Mongolian language,

01:33particularly as it relates to its neighbors in the People's Republic of China and the

01:37issues surrounding it.

01:39And yes, we have done a fair amount of study and research as to the feasibility of adding

01:45that language, but unfortunately, like so many of the other languages that we would

01:50also like to add to reach those people, the recent budget cuts have made this really impossible

01:56to do.

01:58We've put it on our list.

01:59We've looked for it.

02:00We're going to request that funding be made available for it, but unfortunately, it's

02:04just a victim of the current budget situation for which I really feel deeply sorry.

02:09Well, I do, too.

02:10I know that the report for FY25 mentioned that this was something that we should be

02:16doing, and then to cut the resources to make it impossible just seems not in our own national

02:22security interest.

02:23I would agree with you, Congresswoman.

02:25What are some of the other languages that you're looking at, like Mongolian?

02:28Well, there's a number of places that we'd like to think about broadcasting into that

02:33we talk about.

02:34Just off the top of my head, there would be perhaps in the Philippines, the languages

02:38that reach the Philippines, Brazil, India, these places that originally were thought

02:43to have very robust free press availability, which no longer do.

02:49There's many, many parts of the world nowadays that we would like to really consider adding

02:55web broadcast to, and I think that those places would welcome our presence.

02:58Oh, I think so, too.

03:00I'll see if we can't make that case to get that funding back, yet another reason why

03:05the budget shouldn't be cut.

03:09So let me ask you this.

03:11In Eastern Europe, we're seeing more and more regimes becoming more repressive.

03:17You've got Lukashenka in Belarus, and you've got Hungary, Poland.

03:23Moldova seems to be next.

03:24As you look at, after Ukraine, the pieces that start to fall, Moldova certainly is kind

03:30of in that pathway.

03:33We've got a limited presence there, but despite the fact that Moldova gets an awful lot of

03:38propaganda from Russia, could you talk, Mr. Kappas, about some of the maybe bright spots

03:44in that region and how we could increase funding there to push back Russian narratives?

03:50We do have a presence in Moldova, and they're doing some fine work right now.

03:56All across that Eastern Europe, and you get into the Caucasus and other areas, I was just

04:04in Georgia three weeks ago visiting our staff, dedicated staff that we have in Tbilisi.

04:12This is a group of people who not only are Georgian, but this is also a group of people

04:17who we've had to relocate several times.

04:20They used to work for us in some cases in Russia.

04:23Then we moved them to Kiev, and now we've moved them to Tbilisi, thinking that would

04:27be safe.

04:28And now, of course, this terrible, yet another one of these foreign agent laws has been passed

04:34in Georgia, and so they're facing an uncertain future as well.

04:41We can't afford to continue to open one office, close another one, open in a new place, thinking

04:47it's going to be safe.

04:49We've got to, and to be clear, we don't just simply do that as soon as it gets a little

04:57difficult.

04:58Everywhere where we operate right now, things are difficult.

05:01We stay there as long as we can, as long as we can keep our people safe, because the audiences

05:07expect us to be there.

05:09But it's an important task.

05:12There's a lot of overlap with where you are.

05:14You mentioned Georgia and then Kiev and making those moves.

05:19With HDP, the House Democracy Partnership, we are trying to do some of the same things

05:23that you are doing, but working through legislative bodies in some of these countries that are

05:29in very difficult neighborhoods.

05:31I think it's a good partnership, and I'd like to see it strengthened, not weakened by budget

05:36cuts.

05:37We'd love to welcome you to Prague sometime to talk about it.

05:40Thank you.

05:41I yield back.

05:42We'll now go to the gentlelady from Pennsylvania, Ms. Dean, for five minutes.

05:46Hi, thank you, Chairman.

05:47Would the gentlelady yield for just one second?

05:48I just want to get this into record.

05:51I'd ask unanimous consent that documents from Carol Gunzberg.

Dina Titus Presses Agency For Global Media CEO On Language Expansion

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