A federal judge ruled that the appointment of Kari Lake to lead the Voice of America news organization was illegal on Saturday evening, delivering a blow that will result in a stunning reversal of Lake’s months-long campaign to dismantle the agency.
Lake was named acting CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees the Voice of America, in 2025. Her appointment was seen as the beginning of an effort to tear apart the longstanding media institution, and in August of last year, she ordered the firings of more than 500 of its employees.
Those layoffs are now null and void, including her attempt to axe the agency’s old director, which was previously blocked by the courts.
“These expansive delegations were an unlawful effort to transform Lake into the CEO of U.S. Agency for Global Media in all but name,” wrote U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth.
“As a consequence, any actions taken by Lake during her asserted tenure as acting CEO between July 31 and November 19, 2025, including but not limited to the August 29 reduction-in-force effort, or actions taken pursuant to the March or July delegations of CEO authority, are void.”
Lake was not confirmed for the position by the Senate and likely would have faced a tricky confirmation process. She is an outspoken supporter of Donald Trump’s conspiracies and lies about the 2020 election and has even refused to accept her own electoral defeats.
Lake even went as far as referring to herself as the “lawful governor” of Arizona after losing her election to Katie Hobbs in 2022.
The ruling makes Lake the latest in a growing list of appointees whose positions were improperly occupied by the White House and whose efforts to advance the president’s agenda to reshape government were thwarted for the same reason. Her appointment now falls in the same vein as the short tenures of Alina Habba and Lindsey Halligan, Trump loyalists picked for key positions in the Justice Department outside of the proper channels.
Lake’s attempt to scale back Voice of America came under the larger umbrella of a campaign of unilateral cuts to federal programs and agencies that began last year.
At first, headed up by Elon Musk and his “DOGE” team at the White House, the efforts to slash government jobs and services were eventually taken over by individual Cabinet secretaries and agency leaders like Lake, as far-right figures in the government promised windfall savings for taxpayers.
Those savings were a fraction in comparison to the dollar figure put on the passage of the GOP’s “Big, Beautiful Bill”, which surged spending for ICE and extended tax cuts, and added to the national deficit. The legislation is expected to add as much as $4tn to the national debt within ten years.
Since her efforts to make widespread cuts to the agency were blocked last year, Lake has kept a lower profile in her leadership at USAGM while remaining a fixture on conservative media, with appearances on Newsmax and OAN.
As recently as last month, she was touting Voice of America’s work to push its content inside Iran, where information is heavily restricted, and state authorities have shut off internet access for the general population as of this month amid a massive joint U.S. and Israeli bombing campaign.
VOA’s content and that of its sister network Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty were historically associated with and supported by the CIA as part of its pro-American propaganda efforts in the Soviet bloc, but the news agencies now assert editorial independence.
This past week, a journalist with Voice of America Persian, the agency’s Iranian-focused service, claimed he was fired after the agency tried to limit content supportive of the son of the deposed Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi.
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