"Public broadcasting is a very fragile institution," Tomlinson added. "If I cause liberals to lose support for public broadcasting, I will have done the system harm."
The controversy is forcing PBS President Pat Mitchell to navigate some tricky political terrain. She criticized Tomlinson publicly for the first time in a recent New York Times article, saying she believed there have been inappropriate efforts to influence content.
But during a public interest media seminar last week sponsored by the Western Knight Center for Specialized Journalism, Mitchell backed away from that remark, saying she had been referring only to one instance in which Tomlinson told a gathering of member stations last fall that PBS should appeal more to Republican viewers.
She said she would not comment on private conversations she has had with the chairman.
"I don't want to speculate about what his motives are," Mitchell said. "What I care about is what we're doing. And what we're doing is -- any efforts from him, from the other side, from anywhere on the spectrum -- we're going to resist."
The anxiety among public broadcasters has been triggered by several events. In January, PBS decided not to distribute an episode of the children's program "Postcards From Buster" that featured a family with two lesbian moms, a show that Education Secretary Margaret Spellings said should not receive public funding. Several weeks later, PBS sent member stations an edited version of a "Frontline" documentary about U.S. troops in Iraq that cut out the profanity used by soldiers.
In April, Corporation for Public Broadcasting chief Kathleen Cox resigned after nine months on the job. She was replaced by Ken Ferree, a Republican and top advisor to ex-Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell. Ferree raised eyebrows in a New York Times Magazine interview by saying he is seeking more conservative viewers and had trouble naming his favorite PBS shows.
Tomlinson has used his 18-month tenure to scrutinize the political makeup of PBS programming. He complained about bias in the newsmagazine "Now," which was hosted by liberal commentator Bill Moyers until he retired last year.
At one point, Tomlinson quietly hired an outside consultant to track the political views of Moyers' guests in order to bolster his argument. Eventually, PBS picked up new shows featuring conservatives Tucker Carlson and Paul Gigot, but officials were alarmed by Tomlinson's aggressiveness, especially since "Now" is not directly financed by his agency.
