During S.F. visit, Ken Burns calls PBS cuts ‘a shame,' says Donald Trump faces a reckoning
In the hours before taking the stage at the Palace of Fine Arts to present clips and discuss his upcoming PBS documentary, he was working the phones, calling U.S. senators and lobbyists in hopes of safeguarding the future of public media.
By the time he addressed the sold-out crowd on Wednesday, July 16, he seemed resigned to the passing of a $9 billion rescissions package that would end all federal funding for public media. The bill passed on Thursday. It now goes to the House, which is expected to approve the measure, which would slash $1.1 billion from the Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio, later Thursday or Friday.
But in promoting 'The American Revolution,' a 12-hour limited series that traces the very beginnings of the United States, he had plenty to say about the current state of the country. He believes the American system is up against 'an existential threat,' and that President Donald Trump will eventually face a reckoning because 'the dog has caught the school bus, and the school bus, eventually, always wins.'
Calling the cuts 'a shame,' Burns noted the package, which also slashes foreign aid, amounts to 'pennies' in comparison to the $6.75 trillion the U.S. government spent in 2024.
'The entire budget (public media) is less than one bomber,' Burns said. 'I know that public broadcasting has nothing to do with the defense of the country. They just help make the country worth defending.'
The evening was hosted by KQED, which announced Tuesday, July 15, it was laying off 15% of its workforce as it contends with a projected $12 million budget deficit in 2025.
During his lengthy introduction of Burns, KQED President and Chief Executive Officer Michael Isip said public media as well as the country is 'in a state of division and trauma.'
'Our social fabric feels like it's being torn apart,' Isip said. 'Independent, non-commercial public media is more essential than ever. … In many of our communities, especially our smaller ones, the local public television, public radio station is the only source of information.
'This is truly one of the most difficult and distressing times in the nearly 60-year history of public broadcasting and the 71-year history of KQED. But here is what I want you to know: No matter what happens with federal funding, public media, KQED, will reemerge. We will endure.'
Burns introduced a 51-minute clip reel from 'The American Revolution,' which airs on PBS in November, before engaging in a 40-minute discussion with co-director Sarah Botstein, historian Christopher Brown and moderator Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor in chief of the Atlantic magazine.
Bay Area actor Peter Coyote, who narrates the series, also was present, but did not participate in the discussion.
Burns noted that he, Botstein and another co-director, David Schmidt, began work on 'The American Revolution' before Trump's first term. But by the time the documentary airs nearly a year into Trump's second term, viewers might notice some uncanny parallels and contrasts. America's failed invasion of Canada, which Americans had hoped to make the 14th colony, mirrors Trump's desire to make Canada the 51st state.
And, of course, there is the contentious path to the creation of the U.S. Constitution and its staunch belief in the separation of powers and the momentous choice by George Washington, the first president, to step aside after two terms to discourage authoritarianism.
'(The founders) were reverse engineering every possible bad scenario to try to design a system that will prevent that,' Burns said. 'In fact, Jefferson writes to Madison, when he's stuck in Paris while they're writing the Constitution, and he says, 'What if someone should lose an election and pretend false votes and reap the world? ''
Citing a quote from 18th-century revolutionary Thomas Paine, paraphrased as 'in order to be free you must will it,' Burns ended by suggesting that as Trump advances his agenda and simple policies become complex actions, Americans might rediscover their freedom gene.
'There's this real moment where you see, all of a sudden, these arguments about British rights are coming down to natural rights,' Burns said of the Founding Fathers' debates in the documentary. 'The evolution of that is the very same thing that will get us out of this predicament.'
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