WUWF’s NPR Affiliation Safe…For Now

The University of West Florida Board of Trustees apparently will not discuss, in August, ending the affiliation its public radio station, WUWF, has with National Public Radio. The agreement is set to expire in October.

• Former UWF President Dr. Judy Bense told SAVE UWF members that the current president, Manny Diaz Jr. Diaz assured her that canceling NPR was never a prospect and was not on the Board of Trustees agenda in August. Bense was also told that Trustee Zack Smith has never mentioned anything about NPR or WUWF. Note: Smith is a trustee for UWF and Pensacola State College, where he voted to end WSRE’s affiliation with PBS last fall. 

SAVE UWF members were informed of the conversation during a planning and strategy meeting regarding the possibility of the Board of Trustees considering dropping NPR programming.

What’s Next

I stand by my sources and await the agenda for the meeting scheduled for Thursday, Aug. 13, at 9 a.m. at the Museum of Commerce in downtown Pensacola.

• I hope what Dr. Bense was told is accurate. This won’t be the first time my reporting of behind-the-scenes shenanigans has led to a change of course to disprove it. If we have saved WUWF’s NPR affiliation, then I’ll take the criticism.

However, I believe those who want to preserve the NPR affiliation should still write President Diaz (presidentsoffice@uwf.edu) and the trustees so that they will understand its importance.  Check out my Outtakes—”Another Worthy Fight.”

• We need an affirmative public statement from Diaz supporting NPR at WUWF before the meeting, and a board vote to renew the affiliation before it expires in October.

SAVE UWF

SAVE UWF was formed last year to counter Gov. Ron DeSantis’ takeover of the Board of Trustees. Two appointees, Scott Yenor and Adam Kissel, never were confirmed by the Florida Senate.

Yenor is a political science professor at Boise State University, affiliated with the conservative Claremont Institute. He drew national attention in 2021 for remarks at the National Conservatism Conference criticizing feminism and arguing women shouldn’t pursue certain careers like engineering, describing “independent women” as “medicated, meddlesome and quarrelsome.”

At the board’s January 23, 2025, meeting, the newly appointed members voted Yenor in as chairman, while the existing trustees had backed Trustee Richard Baker instead.

Backlash: The appointment triggered immediate community pushback — students protested, and citizens and commissioners spoke out against it. DeSantis initially defended the pick, saying in February he believed Yenor would be “a champion for the classical mission of a university” who would “fight the indoctrination.”

• As his Senate confirmation hearing approached, Yenor resigned by email. Sen. Don Gaetz, whose committee would have had to confirm Yenor, said his office had received “thousands of emails and letters and texts and visits, and not one single person expressed support for Mr. Yenor.”

Adam Kissel had a longer, messier run than Yenor—over a year on the board, but he ultimately left without ever winning Senate confirmation. He is a visiting fellow on higher education reform for the Heritage Foundation, a senior fellow at the Cardinal Institute for West Virginia Policy, and a visiting scholar for the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

• When Gaetz’s committee rejected him, DeSantis reappointed Kissel to the board, which meant the West Virginia resident would face Gaetz again this past March. Kissel resigned in March rather than have to deal with the confirmation hearing.