John Oliver tackled the Trump administration’s defunding of public media on the final “Final Week Tonight” episode of 2025, detailing how the choice to get rid of $1.1 billion from the Company for Public Broadcasting earlier this 12 months had a very extreme affect on native radio and tv stations. So Oliver and “Final Week Tonight” are enjoying a supporting function. The present has launched an public sale web site, John Oliver’s Junk, with 65 objects at present up for bid. That features an unique 1987 portray by the late PBS icon Bob Ross, “The Cabin at Sundown,” which bought for $51,000 at press time.
The concept for the public sale really got here from the Bob Ross Basis, which lately raised $662,000 by auctioning off three unique Roth work to assist public broadcasting.
Oliver introduced the “John Oliver Junk” public sale on Sunday’s present and mentioned the public sale would run till November twenty fourth. “We have really accrued a ton of unusual artifacts through the years on this present, so we will undoubtedly put them up for public sale to lift some much-needed funds,” Oliver mentioned. “Final week, we had been proud to announce that our first-ever public sale, sponsored by Public Media, shall be held tonight. It is the true deal!”
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In case you’re a fan of “Final Week Tonight,” you may acknowledge among the objects up for public sale. These embrace Russell Crowe’s jockstrap (worn by Russell Crowe within the main movement image ‘Cinderella Man’ and later bought on ‘Final Week Tonight with John Oliver’ throughout Season 5 of the present as a part of Crowe’s ‘The Artwork of Divorce, an public sale by which Crowe bought private objects to pay for his divorce’)’ and ‘Mrs Crowe’. “Cabbage Oliver” (“John Oliver’s on-screen spouse marries in an on-screen marriage ceremony officiated by Steve Buscemi. A part of ‘Final Week Tonight’ Season 9 phase about AI-generated artwork by which John marries a cabbage within the studio”).
Additionally included is a big gold-plated recreation of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s testicles (“a sculpture of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s scrotum, a part of the Season 12 part of the Presidential Library”), wax statues of 5 U.S. presidents, and gold Adidas sneakers (“the gold sneakers that John Oliver promised to put on within the Season 2 episode of Final Week Tonight with John Oliver if scandal-plagued FIFA president Sepp Blatter resigns”).
Amongst different issues, a visit to New York to satisfy Oliver. You may additionally obtain a “case of Cabernet Sauvignon, the wine that was made through the years on Final Week Tonight with John Oliver,” an opportunity to look in a photograph over Oliver’s shoulder in the course of the episode, and two VIP tickets to a reside recording of the present.
Oliver’s “Group” colleague Joel McHale additionally seems within the episode, which encompasses a flashback to when McHale hosted a pledge drive on a Seattle PBS station in 1999 that stored individuals speaking about “Mr. Bean.” To commemorate the event, McHale signed a DVD set of episodes of Mr. Bean, which can also be up for public sale.
Oliver spent a lot of Sunday’s episode discussing the plight of public broadcasters: “Public media has been actually modern in reaching underserved audiences. It was public tv stations that first invented subtitles within the Nineteen Seventies. The nation’s broadcasters provide programming in Haitian, Creole, Navajo, Vietnamese, and lots of different languages. However as you are little question conscious, Congress voted this summer season to get rid of the $1.1 billion they have been broadcasting thus far.” Allotted to fund public broadcasting for 2 years. ”
Oliver addressed how Republicans have attacked public media nearly because the second President Johnson first signed the invoice creating the CPB, and defined that criticism of “liberal bias” inside public media is definitely one thing else. “Though there will be trustworthy debates about bias within the media, whether or not liberal or not, I want to level out that what conservatives declare as “liberal bias” is commonly meant to suggest that America has an extended historical past of racism or that homosexuals exist.” It is exhausting to interpret these criticisms as something apart from bigotry, and but such arguments are getting used to justify zeroing out the CPB’s total funds. ”
Oliver additionally famous the irony that with funds cuts, native stations must rely extra on nationwide content material originating from main markets like New York, as an alternative of manufacturing essential area people programming. “Sarcastically, the extra native station budgets are minimize, the extra they might develop into depending on programming produced in city echo chambers. As the manager director of 1 California station mentioned, the native stuff that is so essential to individuals will possible disappear.”
Oliver famous that public radio and tv stations assist essential native investigative reporting in areas the place there are few different information shops. And “Final Week Tonight” has relied on public reporting for its work on topics reminiscent of HOAs, juvenile justice and deadly injection.
“Public media could be a means to disseminate essential info in communities with restricted broadband or cellular phone service,” he mentioned. “Public radio often is the solely approach to broadcast alerts for lacking or at-risk individuals, and it can be essential throughout emergencies like hurricanes.
“Frankly, given the significance of public media, it is all the time been a bit of unusual how little funding public media receives. Right here in the US, we’re an outlier worldwide in how little federal funding public media receives. Even earlier than these cuts, federal spending was lower than $1.60 per individual, in comparison with international locations like Norway, Sweden, and the UK, which spend nearly $100 or extra,” he added. “And analysis exhibits there’s a constructive correlation between the energy of public media methods and the well being of democracy… Ideally, we’d work on long-term fixes to how the CPB is funded, and as an alternative of giving Congress the ability to remove funds each two years. , would undoubtedly enact some type of tax or license price that may very well be funded. That is what individuals have been advocating for because the CPB was first established. Sadly, we do not reside in that world proper now.” And till that occurs, public media is in a dire state of affairs proper now. ”
