A U.S.-funded news nonprofit quietly put hundreds of pieces of broadcast gear up for auction while its website and operations were paused during a funding lapse, and the sale has set off a partisan fight over who is responsible and what taxpayers should expect. Lawmakers are demanding answers as the agency that oversees the outlet promises audits and insists funding was provided.
Radio Free Asia gets roughly sixty million dollars a year from the American government to produce reporting across Asia, and officials say operations were suspended when funding hit a snag during the government shutdown. While its public-facing services went dark, staff and contractors noticed equipment appearing for sale on a public auction platform. That contradiction — a blackout of news output while assets were liquidated — is what’s driving much of the anger.
The listings included high-definition cameras, teleprompters, lenses and even office refrigerators listed at shockingly low starting bids. Some items showed opening prices under a dollar, and several professional lenses and broadcast units appeared at fire-sale levels. More than a thousand pieces of equipment were on the block, a scale that prompted immediate questions about oversight and asset management.
California Congressman Darrell Issa pushed back hard, calling the auctions a betrayal of taxpayers and a needless destruction of value. He framed the liquidation as spiteful and wasteful, arguing it deserved a swift and public accounting. “I’ve never seen such belligerence by an organization that gets a hundred percent of its money from the U.S. government,” Issa said. “Lenses you’d pay thousands of dollars for are being sold for pennies. It’s clear they’re liquidating assets out of spite.”
RFA’s public response blamed previous budget decisions and the shutdown for forcing difficult choices, portraying the moves as pragmatic rather than punitive. In an official statement, the organization wrote, “The Administration’s unlawful termination and disruption of RFA’s timely funding, followed by an extended government shutdown, has forced the company to drastically reduce operational costs to set up for long-term success,” the statement read. That line has done little to calm critics who say the timing and scale of the sales deserve scrutiny.
The outlet also defended its approach to keeping critical personnel and mission-focused assets intact while shedding items it said it could no longer use. “Shedding equipment we can no longer use, while retaining key personnel and assets, responsibly positions RFA to continue editorial operations that hold the Chinese Communist Party and other authoritarian governments to account,” RFA said. Even so, the optics of low-dollar listings for expensive gear left many lawmakers unconvinced.
Kari Lake, Deputy Executive at the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees the nonprofit, publicly disputed RFA’s explanation and signaled a much tougher line. “Everything they said was not true,” Lake shot back. She added pointedly, “We are funding them. We’ve given them every single penny appropriated to them. Eighty cents for an HD camera? That’s a slap in the face to taxpayers,” Lake said. In a follow-up directive to RFA she warned, “The insanity ends now. Be prepared to open your doors next week for our team of auditors to find out what on earth is going on at RFA, as permitted under the grant agreement and applicable regulations.”
The dispute is now a test of accountability for government-funded media: how assets are tracked, who decides what to sell, and how taxpayers get explanations. RFA says it intends to rebuild operations if Congress restores funding and argues it has preserved the core capabilities needed to carry on reporting. Lawmakers and watchdogs will now push for documents, audits and a public timeline so this episode does not end as another unanswered loss of taxpayer value.
