Owner Jeff Bezos blocks washington post Failure to support a presidential candidate within two weeks of Election Day. The editorial board was drafting a letter of support for Kamala Harris.
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
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Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
washington post The paper has been rocked by a wave of digital subscriber cancellations and a wave of columnist resignations as the paper grapples with the fallout from owner Jeff Bezos’ decision to block Vice President Kamala Harris’ support for the president. There is.
More than 200,000 people had canceled their digital subscriptions by midday Monday, according to two people familiar with the matter. Not all cancellations take effect immediately. Still, that figure represents about 8% of the paper’s roughly 2.5 million paying subscribers, including print subscribers. The number of cancellations continued to rise Monday afternoon.
A spokesperson for the company declined to comment because The Washington Post is a privately held company.
“That’s a huge number,” said Yuan. post Editor-in-Chief Marcus Brauchli told NPR. “The problem is that people don’t know why that decision was made. They basically know that the decision was made, but they don’t know what led to that decision.”
Chief Executive Officer and Publisher Will Lewis speaks on Friday explained the decision Do not support it as a return to statehood in this year’s presidential election or in future elections. postOur roots: For many years we called ourselves an “independent newspaper.”
But given the timing, just days before the close race between Harris and former President Donald Trump, few within the newspaper believe that rationale.
Former editor-in-chief Marty Barron expressed his skepticism in an interview with NPR. morning paper on monday.
“If this decision had been made three years ago, two years ago, maybe a year ago, it would have been good,” Barron said. “It’s certainly a rational decision, but it was taken within weeks of the election and without any substantive serious deliberation with the paper’s editorial board. Not on high principle grounds. The decision was clearly made for other reasons.”
In fact, in his own opinion, post On Monday night, Bezos acknowledged that the timing wasn’t ideal.
“It was poor planning and not a deliberate strategy,” he wrote.
post Reporters uncovered repeated allegations of misconduct and misconduct by Trump and his associates. The separately operated editorial page characterizes President Trump as a threat to America’s democratic experiment. some post Journalists said their relatives were among those who canceled their subscriptions.
The mass cancellations “show the polarization of the times we live in and the energy people feel about these issues,” Brauchli said. “This gives people a reason to act on their mood.”
Brauchli has publicly encouraged people not to cancel their reservations. post Protest subscription.
“It’s a way to send a message to owners, but it’s going to be a pain in the ass for people who care about in-depth, high-quality journalism like newspapers.” post ,” he said. “Not many organizations can do this. post that’s right. Scope and depth of reporting by of the post Journalists are among the best in the world. ”
Even a rival new york timesif circulation levels were much higher, large-scale protests could be recorded in the low thousands. Earlier this year, Lewis post The publisher touted the paper’s 4,000 net increase in subscribers as noteworthy.
3 of the top 10 stories viewed on of the post Website Sunday was an article written by post Staff members were outraged by Bezos’ decision. Topping the list was humor columnist Alexandra Petri. piecethe headline said, “As a humor columnist, I have decided to support Harris as presidential candidate.” Over 174,000 people are reading it online.
Resignation due to Bezos’ decision
Amazon founder and billionaire Bezos’ decision was first reported by NPR on Friday. In the days since then, two columnists have resigned from the paper and two writers have resigned from the editorial board.
One such writer, Molly Roberts, warned of the possible consequences of an 11th-hour decision to remain silent and not publish an editorial supporting Ms. Harris. “Donald Trump is not yet a dictator,” she said in a statement posted on social media. “But the quieter we are, the closer he comes.”
Another author, David Hoffman, won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing on Thursday, the day before Bezos’ decision was made public. The Pulitzer judges praised him for his “compelling and well-researched series on the new technologies and tactics used by authoritarian regimes to suppress dissent in the digital age, and how to combat them.” Evaluated.
“For decades, Washington Post editorials have been a beacon of hope for dissidents, political prisoners, and the voiceless,” Hoffman said in a letter Monday, explaining his decision to leave the editorial board. . “When victims of oppression were harassed, deported, imprisoned, or killed, we informed the whole world of the truth.
“With Donald Trump’s candidacy, we face a very real threat of authoritarianism,” Hoffman wrote in a letter to op-ed page editor David Shipley obtained by NPR. I believe it,” he added. “I think it is unacceptable and unconscionable that we have lost our voice.”
Mr. Hoffman plans to remain with the paper, saying, “I have no intention of leaving the Post after 42 years.” He writes that several projects have been launched, including “expanding efforts to support press freedom around the world.”
Mr. Shipley held a contentious meeting with a number of opinion section staff members on Monday afternoon, during which they asked the editorial page director tough questions, including demands for action from Mr. Bezos.
As recently as last week, Mr. Shipley said he was trying to get Mr. Bezos to reverse his decision, according to a person present. Mr Shipley added: “We failed.”
Questions about Bezos’ timing and motivations
Former columnist and editor-in-chief Robert Kagan explained his decision to resign from the paper on CNN Friday night.
Kagan noted that officials from Bezos’ aerospace company, Blue Origin, met with Trump hours after the decision was made public, saying, “We actually bowed the knee to Donald Trump. “Because I’m scared of Trump’s actions.”
Blue Origin has a multi-billion dollar contract with NASA. During the Trump administration, Amazon sued the government for blocking a $10 billion cloud computing services contract with the Pentagon, citing the then-president’s anger over the news. postwhich is personally owned by Bezos.
But Bezos staunchly supported staff interviews during the Trump years (and did not interfere with reporting about his business interests or personal life).
Bezos: “I’m not the ideal owner of the Post”
Bezos publicly broke his silence late Monday. In an opinion piece, he characterized his decision to end support for the president as an attempt to avoid “perceptions of bias” and “non-independence.” He denied allegations that he was trying to appease Mr. Trump or protect other business interests.
“There is no quid pro quo at work here,” he wrote, adding that he did not consult or inform candidates about his decisions.
Mr. Bezos said on Friday, the same day the newspaper announced the decision, that he was unaware of the meeting between Blue Origin executives and Mr. Trump.
“When I learned that, I sighed because I knew it was going to give ammunition to people who were going to frame this as anything other than a principled decision,” he said.
He acknowledged that his stakes in other companies and lucrative government contracts with them complicate matters for the United States. post.
“Given the nature of the conflict, I am not the ideal owner of the Post,” he wrote. “I can assure you that my views here are indeed principled, and I believe my track record as owner of the Post since 2013 supports this.”
