RT Editor-in-Chief Slams US Senators for Inflating Wasington Bureau Budget

The RT television channel’s editor-in-chief slammed on Thursday two US lawmakers for overinflating the budget of its Washington office, as the US Senate prepares to debate a bill to counter alleged foreign propaganda.

MOSCOW, (Sputnik) — On Wednesday, US Senators Rob Portman and Chris Murphy submitted a bipartisan bill to the upper house of the US parliament which is aimed at countering "foreign government propaganda."

Making the case for the motion, Portman argued that foreign-funded RT news channel "reportedly spends $400 million annually just on its Washington Bureau alone." He did not specify the source of that report.

The figure was later circulated by the US federal government’s external broadcaster The Voice of America (VOA), as well as by Germany’s Deutsche Welle.

"US Senator Portman blatantly lied about the mythical $400 million that RT allegedly spends on the Washington bureau alone, and Western media were glad to circulate this lie," Margarita Simonyan said.

Simonyan urged VOA and Deutsche Welle to be more diligent in fact-checking. "The budget of the entire channel is 1.5 times smaller, this information is open and has been published multiple times," she asserted.

Last month, the RT editor-in-chief said that the broadcaster's annual budget for all of its channels stood at around $225 million, while that of the US Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which controls VOA, was over $721 million.

RT television network encompasses three 24/7 news channels broadcasting from Moscow in English, Arabic and Spanish in more than 100 countries around the globe. The network also comprises RT America and RT UK channels broadcasting from studios in Washington and London.

The network additionally includes the RTD documentary channel and global news video agency RUPTLY, which offers exclusive content to channels around the world. RT is available around-the-clock to 700 million international viewers.