National Public Radio celebrated Independence Day by tweeting out the entire Declaration of Independence in 140-character pieces, causing many Donald Trump supporters to take the message as a political stance against the president.
It’s unclear if the Twitter users mocking NPR’s feed didn’t realize the rhetoric was from the Declaration of Independence or if they were simply looking for any sign of liberal bias, but they were quick to defend Trump nonetheless.
Without knowing context, portions of the Declaration of Independence could be considered anti-Trump. NPR has been reading the entire document on air every July 4 for 29 years. Still, the Twitter version upset many conservatives.
Many Trump supporters took exception with the following line, “It is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.”
One user wrote, “So, NPR is calling for revolution. Interesting way to condone the violence while trying to sound ‘patriotic.’ Your implications are clear.”
Others made comments that Trump should defund NPR because of the series of tweets.
Back in March, Trump made good on a long-time conservative goal in his first proposed budget, targeting the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities for complete elimination.
Trump’s budget would zero out the $445 million budget for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a relatively small source of funding for programming and broadcast operations on public TV stations and NPR radio stations nationwide, per the Washington Post.
Check out some of the responses to NPR tweeting out the Declaration of Independence:
https://twitter.com/ScandalSheet/status/882323029912694785
So, NPR is calling for revolution.
Interesting way to condone the violence while trying to sound "patriotic".
Your implications are clear.— D.G.Davies (@JustEsrafel) July 4, 2017
https://twitter.com/ScandalSheet/status/882323029912694785
this is why you're going to get defunded
— darren_mills (@darren_mills) July 4, 2017
Seriously, this is the dumbest idea I have ever seen on twitter. Literally no one is going to read 5000 tweets about this trash.
— darren_mills (@darren_mills) July 4, 2017
https://twitter.com/xebec78/status/882315686713929728
Glad you are being defunded. You have never been balanced on your show.
— Alma sanchez (@Almasan93753248) July 4, 2017