CARBONDALE, Ill. — Larry Hunter arrived at the Carbondale Farmers Market on a recent Saturday with an edict from his wife — “don’t come home without three tomatoes,” she said — and a hope that he could help raise a bit of money, a dollar or five at a time. Maybe it wouldn’t make a dent, he knew, but these days anything is something for public media affiliates fighting to survive.

For months, Hunter, interim executive director of WSIU, had grappled with the fallout from the looming budget cuts tied to President Donald Trump’s directive to defund public media. Backed by Congress , more than a billion dollars in funding, to be funneled through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to stations around the country, was disappearing.

The CPB, itself, has announced it will close by the end

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