“I feel that if we in public television can only make it clear that feelings are mentionable and manageable, we will have done a great service for mental health.” 

Those words were spoken in 1969 by Fred Rogers during a testimony before the U.S. Senate to defend funding for Public Broadcasting. Nearly 56 years later, PBS CEO Paula Kerger echoed Rogers’ defense during a congressional subcommittee hearing on March 26, citing that the American public has consistently ranked public television as “one of the best investments the government makes.”

In many ways, the Trump administration’s current call to defund PBS and NPR is nothing new.