Republican FCC Commissioner and Big Tech critic Brendan Carr says Apple is blocking Voice of America's mobile app from its App Store in China and he wants some answers, actually a single answer, from Apple CEO Tim Cook by the end of the month.

Following Cook's speech last week to an IAPP Global Privacy Summit April 12 in Washington, one in which he spoke eloquently, according to Carr, about "Apple’s commitment to operating its App Store in a manner that promotes privacy and human rights," Carr said the CEO's words did not match "the reality" of the company's actions in China.

Also: FCC's Carr Slams Twitter

Carr focused on what he said was Apple's decision to remove the VOA app to "appease" the Chinese Communist Party, a move he said "cannot be squared with your representation in Washington that Apple will 'battle against an array of dangerous actors' nor your claim that Apple will 'protect people’s fundamental rights' from abusive surveillance."

Carr's office had not returned a request at press time for a comment on where he had learned of Apple's blocking of the VOA App.

VOA is the U.S. Agency for Global Media-funded operation providing independent news to places that lack access to it.

Also: Carr Says Big Tech Should Pay Into USF

Carr said that the relatively new mobile app allows smart phone users to access the kind of unfiltered news the broadcast operation has been providing for decades, calling it an "important tool" for information on authoritarian regimes, "unless, of course, you are an iPhone user in China."

He ripped the company for its overall relationship with China, including extensive manufacturing operations there, but said he was just looking for the answer to one question by April 29: "Will Apple allow access to the Voice of America mobile app through its App Store in China, consistent with the fundamental human rights that you articulated in your speech?" ■

The Society to Protect Journalists is not happy with the resignation of VOA leadership and the apparent new direction of the government-funded independent international broadcasting operations under the helm of new Agency for Global Media CEO Michael Pack, saying the Trump Administration appears to be turning it into a propaganda arm. 

The Senate June 4 approved the nomination of conservative documentary filmmaker Michael Pack as head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) with the title CEO of the Broadcasting Board of Governors.  

Related: White House Slammed for Blocking VOA Access 

VOA director Amanda Bennett and her deputy, Sandra Sugawara, resigned June 15, VOA reported, saying that gave Pack the freedom to replace them with his own picks, though such resignations are more associated with political appointees at the change of administration's.  

President Trump has accused VOA of badmouthing the U.S. in the past, branding its broadcasts as "disgusting." VOA and other government-funded global media are specifically chartered as independent new outlets, not U.S. propaganda outlets. 

"It has become clear from the actions taken at the Voice of America and the Agency for Global Media that the intention of newly appointed director Michael Pack is to move the agency away from its charter and legal position of providing independent and unbiased reporting to that of a propaganda machine similar to those found in totalitarian states," CPJ said in a statement. 

“To keep going in the direction that the administration seems set upon will remove the very strength that has established VOA as a highly respected, professional news organization,” said CPJ president Patricia Gallagher Newberry. “It would be awful if VOA were to become a propaganda arm of the U.S. government.” 

Independent watchdog group Freedom House is slamming what it said is the Trump Administration's attack on press freedom, in this case an outlet funded by the government.

“VOA is one of the largest and most trusted independent news agencies in the world,” said Freedom House President Michael J. Abramowitz. “Efforts to blacklist VOA journalists from interview requests to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are an unprecedented attack on press freedom in the United States.” 

Freedom House cites documents released under a FOIA request by the Knight First Amendment Institute that found that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention staff had been instructed to ignore requests from interview and info requests from the Voice of America. 

Related: VOA Leadership Resigns 

Those instructions, reported on by VOA, cited an April 10 White House statement accusing VOA of speaking for U.S. Adversaries, including promoting China's response to the pandemic. 

President Trump has accused VOA of badmouthing the U.S. in the past, branding its broadcasts as "disgusting." VOA and other government-funded global media are specifically chartered as independent new outlets, not U.S. propaganda outlets.

One issue for the President was the two years that the nomination of his new head of VOA parent Agency for Global Media (USAGM), Michael Pack, was held up by Democrats. Pack finally got his vote of approval by the Senate Republican Majority June 4, which prompted the resignation of VOA leadership.

The top two people running Voice of America have resigned in the wake of the confirmation of a new CEO of the parent U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM). 

The Senate June 4 approved the nomination of conservative documentary filmmaker Michael Pack as head of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) with the title CEO of the Broadcasting Board of Governors. 

Related: Senate Approves Global Media CEO Pack

VOA director Amanda Bennett and her deputy, Sandra Sugawara, resigned June 15, VOA reported, saying that gives Pack the freedom to replace them with his own picks. 

They sought to reassure the staff, according to VOA. "[N]othing about you, your passion, your mission or your integrity, changes' with Pack’s takeover of VOA and other U.S. government media organizations," it reported. 

“Michael Pack swore before Congress to respect and honor the firewall that guarantees VOA’s independence, which in turn plays the single most important role in the stunning trust our audiences around the world have in us,” they added. 

Pack's nomination was held up for a couple of years by Democrats concerned about his ties to conservative Trump confidant Steve Bannon. 

The New York Times reported that the nomination holdup was also tied to an investigation into the funding relationship between Pack's nonprofit and for-profit film group.  

USAGM oversees government-funded independent news outlets providing info to countries where press freedom is problematic. Those outlets include the iconic Voice of America, which Trump attacked during the press conference, saying what was coming out of VOA was "disgusting."  

In pushing for funding cuts for international broadcasting, the White House said that it has concluded that "information statecraft and public diplomacy programs by the U.S. Government have been tepid, fragmented, and not fully effective in countering the exploitation of information by U.S. rivals." The Administration has said it doesn't want to continue to fund projects whose effectiveness is unknown and whose efforts are not coordinated across government agencies. 

VOA and the other outlets used to be overseen by the Broadcasting Board of Governors, but the President moved to a CEO-led model.  

Pack is president of film and TV production company Manifold Productions where he has written and directed documentaries (God and the Inner City, The Fall of Newt Gingrich, Campus Culture Wars: Five Stories about Political Correctness), principally for PBS. He served as SVP of TV programming for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in 2003-2006 and in 2002-2005 served on the National Council on the Humanities.  

Pack is no stranger to VOA, having served as director of WORLDNET, which is now VOA-TV.