A year after Trump administration cuts, Voice of America and its sister outlets are mostly shadows of their former selves

Layoffs, lawsuits and lost trust have left US-funded global news outlets diminished, creating openings for authoritarian leaders abroad

Begum Donmez Ersoz was in the hospital for high blood pressure, 29 weeks pregnant with twins, when she got her first termination letter from Voice of America.

For nearly seven years, Donmez Ersoz had worked for the broadcaster, covering the White House for audiences in Turkey — a country in which “all possible means” are used to stifle critics, according to Reporters Without Borders. But that job seemed to evaporate in an instant last March when President Donald Trump ordered the elimination of Voice of America and its sister media outlets under the U.S. Agency for Global Media.

That night, doctors told Donmez Ersoz she would have to deliver her twins. For the next several months, Donmez Ersoz had to juggle worries about the health of her children — both of whom had to stay in the neonatal intensive care unit for an extended period of time — and concerns over the loss of her job and the health insurance that came with it. Voice of America, which had largely shut down by that point, was of no help.

“It was the scariest time and the hardest time of my life,” Donmez Ersoz said.