The nominee to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) invoked the struggles of North Korean defectors during her confirmation hearing Thursday in Washington, D.C., telling lawmakers the impact American radio broadcasts had on those who would later flee the regime. 

“In Seoul, North Korean defectors told me that snippets of American radio were the first hints they heard of another kind of life,” Sarah Rogers said in her opening remarks to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

“These defectors risked torture and risked death, fleeing toward a freedom they only heard existed here,” she added.

Rogers, currently undersecretary of