by Cathy Cai
On March 21, 2025, WhyNot magazine, a Chinese-language news outlet “created for a new generation of readers,” announced in a letter that it would suspend operations following the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM)’s termination of funding for Radio Free Asia (RFA), with which WhyNot was affiliated. Founded in September 2020 under the banner of being “in-depth, visual, uncensored” and “independent and without borders,” the magazine had sought to “offer readers an alternative perspective on the world.”
The editors’ letter, published on WhyNot‘s website and Instagram, sparked mixed reactions. The letter reflected on the magazine’s founding mission and highlighted its reporting over the past five years, including coverage of the June 4 commemoration, Hong Kong’s deteriorating political climate following the 2019 pro-democracy movement, and developments in Chinese civil society. It also documented the crackdown on human rights lawyers, efforts to recover the history of China’s feminist movement, and the White Paper Movement (when, in 2022, nationwide protests erupted against China’s strict Zero-COVID policy, protesters held up blank sheets of white paper as a symbol of government repression and the lack of freedom of speech) —subjects that cannot be freely reported within China.
While many readers expressed gratitude for WhyNot‘s reporting and hoped to “see you again,” others questioned the magazine’s claim to independence. “Why don’t you label your account as U.S. state-controlled media?” one commenter asked, continuing, “You claim to be independent while your funding comes from Congress.” Another reader wrote, “Compared to VOA and RFA, WhyNot is relatively more objective. The articles from Voice of America (VOA) and RFA in recent years… hard to comment.” One reader suggested, “If you have to halt operations as soon as your funding is cut, can you really claim to be objective?”
The Outdated Framework of Reporting
VOA, founded in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda, and RFA, which was created in response to the 1989 crackdown on Tiananmen Square and which began broadcasting to China in 1996, have been major sources for Chinese readers to gain access to news, especially on topics such as politics and human rights, which cannot be freely reported in China.
However, in the digital media era, Chinese readers still rely on VOA and RFA for news coverage but no longer consider them indispensable. Other sources accessible from overseas, or with the use of a VPN within China, include the BBC and the New York Times, which provide reporting in Chinese, as well as independent, overseas Chinese publications such as Initium Media (based in Singapore) and Mangmang magazine (based in Amsterdam) that emerged in the past decade. With more coverage on diverse topics and in-depth reporting, from cultural critics and features on China’s feminist movement and LGBTQ rights to overseas Chinese diaspora and international civil society organizations, they have been an alternative, if not a preferable choice, to VOA and RFA for readers with more liberal and progressive politics.
John Tsang, a former editor at WhyNot and contributor to RFA and VOA, argued that RFA had become constrained by bureaucratic structures and an increasingly outdated editorial framework.
Past VOA and RFA Contributors Advocate for Reform
Wu Yang has contributed reporting to both VOA and RFA, and collaborated with VOA on a podcast series called Transpacific Calls (Yue Yang Dian Hua). Wu recalled meeting the VOA Beijing bureau chief Bill Ild in 2016 and discussing how VOA could influence young people in China. Wu pointed out that VOA was giving readers the impression that the organization sold tabloid news that read like political gossip. After Trump closed down VOA, accusing it of being “radical” and “anti-Trump,” Wu became interested in interviewing some of its veteran journalists, but he was disappointed by their outdated journalistic practices, such as the tendency to explain developments in China primarily through elite politics and leadership changes, and thus producing a binary and overly simplified account of Chinese society.
In a March 2025 interview that appeared on the popular Chinese politics podcast Bumingbai, hosted independently by New York Times journalist Yuan Li and WhyNot‘s Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief Alex Zhang, Zhang explained that while RFA had been built in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, WhyNot was conceived to respond to a different media environment, one in which Chinese readers had no shortage of breaking news but relatively little access to long-form reporting, dialogue, or analytical journalism.
Another former WhyNot editor, who asked to be identified as “Li,” told Project Censored that the magazine was conceived from the outset as a distinct brand from Radio Free Asia (RFA), rather than another RFA news outlet. WhyNot targeted Chinese-speaking readers in China and abroad, particularly those aged 20 to 40.
Attempts at Renovation
The strategy appears to have been successful. At the time of writing, WhyNot‘s Instagram account had more than fifty-eight thousand followers, compared with approximately twenty-one thousand for RFA Mandarin.
Beyond its digital presence, the magazine also cultivated an offline readership. It sold its print edition at Sinophone cultural spaces such as Zephyr Society in New York City, a community venue established after the 2022 White Paper Movement that has become a hub for younger Chinese-speaking communities.
Former staff members similarly emphasized the publication’s editorial culture. John Tsang, who began contributing to WhyNot as a freelance reporter before joining the magazine as an editor, described it as offering “an unimaginable degree of freedom” in deciding what to report. He was most proud of a profile of independent journalist Huang Xueqin and activist Wang Jianbing, both detained in 2021, and his reporting on the White Paper Movement in Tokyo.
He also valued WhyNot‘s willingness to publish stories unlikely to appear in traditional political news outlets, including cultural features such as “Twenty Years After My Fair Princess: Where Are the Stars Now?”
A similar editorial philosophy informed Transpacific Calls. Rather than following VOA’s conventional focus on breaking political news, the podcast promised to “use specific voices and stories,” “abandon abstract concepts and grand narratives,” and “build new connections with the world and with history from the perspective of witnesses.” Wu’s series “My Voice, Our Story: The Young Generation with White Paper in Hand” received the 2024 SOPA Award for Excellence in Audio Reporting.
Editorial independence
Tsang recalled that upon joining WhyNot, HR had emphasized the existence of the “firewall” in protecting WhyNot’s editorial independence from the US government.
According to the USAGM Firewall Factsheet, “The USAGM Networks enjoy statutory protection from interference by government entities and authorities, to include the USAGM Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and the Secretary of State, who ‘shall respect the professional independence and integrity’ of VOA, OCB, RFE/RL, RFA, MBN, and any other USAGM funded network.”
Tsang felt that this was true until the second term of Trump’s administration. Zhang also said in the Bumingbai podcast, “When the new administration came into office and started shutting down USAID, people at RFA were already making all kinds of contingency plans.”
During the wave of crackdowns on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion initiatives, Tsang recalled being forwarded a list compiled by Republican senators of WhyNot articles on feminism, criticizing them for containing what they deemed overly explicit descriptions of the body. Following the criticism, he said, the magazine reduced its coverage of feminist issues.
Both Tsang and Li felt that since Trump’s second term, a growing sense of self-protection had emerged within WhyNot. “There was some self-censorship,” Li said.
Li acknowledged that VOA and RFA, as US government-funded media organizations, inevitably operate within the framework of US foreign policy. He recalled reading the VOA Charter, which states that “the long-range interests of the United States are served by communicating directly with the peoples of the world by radio” and that, “to be effective, the Voice of America must win the attention and respect of listeners.”
At the same time, Li said that under previous administrations, he had not regarded this institutional mission as incompatible with his professional identity as a journalist. His goal was to report news that Chinese media couldn’t report, and since he wasn’t required to write fake news or outright propaganda, it wasn’t a problem if his work aligned with American diplomatic interests.
“Before, I didn’t feel that those two aspects necessarily contradicted each other,” Li said.
Given the current political climate in the United States—with RFA having resumed broadcasting to China in February this year, but WhyNot still waiting to return to service—Li was unable to elaborate further.
The Future of Reporting on China
For media outlets, funding sources matter most, Tsang said. “I admit that these media serve to carry some American soft power; of course, you can criticize it this way from a left-wing perspective. But we’re not talking about the same problem. My problem is the China problem. The stories I’ve written should’ve appeared in a China with a free press. But it’s not possible, and that’s the problem.”
Wu’s podcast collaboration ended at the end of 2024, after a new editor-in-chief shifted VOA’s priorities toward short-form video. Wu believed the change reflected a preference for content that met the demands of the attention economy, prioritizing engagement over narrative, long-form podcasts.
“It’s a shame,” Wu said. “VOA isn’t a for-profit business, so why pursue traffic? Maybe the numbers simply look better on paper for USAGM.”
Wu now works as an independent journalist and has started a new Chinese narrative podcast, Secret Forest in the West Suburbs (Xi Jiao Mi Lin).
“When a news outlet is shut down like this, regardless of its political orientation, whether it leans liberal or conservative, we lose a channel through which we can access information,” Zilu, a reader of VOA and RFA, said in the Bumingbai podcast. “Those of us in the United States can still rely on English-language media for news and information. But we also need to think about people elsewhere in the world, especially in China, many of whom do not speak English.”
Cathy Cai was born and raised in China, and currently lives in the US, covering the Chinese diaspora and migration, as well as human rights in China. For fear of government repercussions, the author uses a pseudonym.
This content originally appeared on Project Censored and was authored by Kiley Eriksen.