The National Endowment for the Arts announced today that its communications director Yosi Sergant has resigned from his position after his involvement in an Aug. 10 teleconference with artists and United We Serve, a White House program that promotes volunteerism, came under scrutiny. Sergant will remain at the agency in another capacity.

Critics charged that the NEA, whose mandate requires that it remain politically neutral, should not have been involved in the call, which urged artists “to help lay a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda — health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.”

Sergant had worked with artist Shepard Fairey and organized concerts in support of Obama before joining the NEA. After hearing the news, Fairey wrote on his blog, "We really needed him. I feel very sad right now."

Fox News host Glenn Beck had been a major source of the criticism leveled against Sergant. On Sept. 1 Beck told viewers, "It's an amazing thing to see that your president, your White House, your government is trying to trick you, use your tax dollars to change your mind. It's called propaganda."

United We Serve, which Beck argued was attempting to promote a political message along with the NEA, was created in 1993 as a private-public partnership and is administered by First Lady Michelle Obama. On Wednesday Senator John Cornyn, a Republican from Texas, expressed his concerns about the call in an open letter to President Obama.

"I may be a self-educated man," Beck said on the broadcast. "But I am a man who has spent a lot of time trying to do my homework."

Read more at the Huffington Post.