The number of newspapers endorsing presidential candidates has declined over the past two decades due to financial difficulties in the newspaper industry, in part due to a lack of subscriptions by some who take a clear stand in a politically polarized era. This is because management believes there is no point in alienating people.
But last week, the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times angered their readers for exactly the opposite reason: by choosing not to select a favored candidate.
The fallout from both decisions continued Monday, with Post owner Jeff Bezos taking the unusual step of publicly defending the moves in his newspaper column. Three members of the paper’s editorial board resigned, and some journalists implored readers not to voice their opposition by canceling their subscriptions. Thousands of people have already done so.
In a note to readers, Bezos said that ending support was a principled position. He says people basically don’t care and see it as a sign of prejudice. His comments came hours after NPR reported that more than 200,000 people canceled their Washington Post subscriptions.
If NPR’s report is true, it would be a stunning blow to the station, which had more than 2.5 million subscribers last year but was in the red and had its staff cut. A Post spokeswoman declined to comment on the report.
The number of subscribers has been decreasing in the past few days.
The Times admitted it had lost thousands of subscribers due to its decisions.
Both newspapers were reportedly preparing editorials supporting Democrat Kamala Harris. Instead, at the direction of Bezos and the Times’ Patrick Soon-Shiong, they decided not to support it. Post publisher Will Lewis called it a “statement of support for readers’ ability to make their own decisions.”
But by announcing their decisions less than two weeks after Election Day, newspapers are confident that their publishers won’t upset Republican Donald Trump if voters return him to power. He was criticized for trying to do so. “They didn’t seem to be making a principled decision,” said John Woolley, co-director of the American Presidency Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Former Post editor-in-chief Martin Barron said on social media that the decision showed “disturbing spinelessness in an institution known for its courage” and that President Trump would see it as further invitation to blackmail Bezos. said.
Recognition has a long history
In the 1800s, newspapers were highly partisan in both their news pages and editorials. Even as the push for unbiased reporting took hold in the 1900s, editorial pages still had their voices, and the two functions remained separate.
In 2008, 92 of America’s 100 largest newspapers endorsed either Democrat Barack Obama or Republican John McCain for president. But by 2020, only 54 people had chosen between Trump and Joe Biden, according to the Presidents Project. Woolley said he doesn’t even plan to count the numbers, saying he suspects there will be even fewer this year.
Research showed that readers paid little attention to advocacy, and in a digital world, many did not understand the difference between a straight news story and an advocacy-driven editorial. In many cases, chain store ownership took decisions out of the hands of local editors. With the news industry struggling right now, we didn’t want to give our readers an excuse to leave.
“They don’t really want to offend or offend people who don’t like what they support,” said Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst at the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank. ” he says. “The only solution is just not to do them.”
That sentiment doesn’t seem to resonate with newspapers in two liberal-populated metropolitan areas. Under Barron’s leadership, the Post’s circulation soared during the Trump administration with aggressive political reporting that frequently angered the former president.
The Post’s decision sparked outrage from many quarters.
The decision was condemned by Barron as well as Watergate-era news legends Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Columnists Robert Kagan and Michelle Norris said they were quitting their jobs at the newspaper in protest. Three of the nine members of the paper’s editorial board said they were leaving their roles.
Karin Klein, an editorial writer for Out West’s Los Angeles Times, wrote in The Hollywood Reporter that she is leaving the paper. Klein said Soon-Shiong has the right to impose his will on editorial policy, but by announcing his disapproval in the final stages of the campaign, he is effectively denying the neutrality he claims he seeks. He said that he was expressing the opposite.
In fact, it was the timing of Bezos’ expression of regret. “I wish the changes had been made sooner and a little further away from the election and the emotions surrounding it,” he wrote. “It was poor planning and not a deliberate strategy.”
More than 2,000 people left comments on a subsequent fallout article posted on the Post’s website on Monday, many saying they were quitting. Even former Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney said she would cancel.
“What I’ve seen over the past few days is that the paper is listening very clearly to its subscribers,” Postmedia critic Eric Wemple said in an online chat Monday.
There are concerns that journalists may be harmed.
The protests have left some journalists feeling anxious and worried that they will only end up hurting themselves and their colleagues. The union representing Los Angeles Times workers issued a statement last week saying that “before you press the ‘cancel’ button,” the company should be aware that subscription fees cover the salaries of hundreds of journalists.
“The more cancellations we have, the more jobs will be lost and the more good journalism will be lost,” Post columnist Dana Milbank wrote.
One commenter on the newspaper’s website said Monday that it would be better to boycott Amazon, which Mr. Bezos founded, than the Washington Post.
Milbank also said he was upset by the decision. He helped write a protest letter signed by some of the paper’s columnists. But he noted that there was no evidence that Mr. Bezos interfered with the Post’s editorial operations, other than the endorsement decision.
“For the past nine years, I’ve branded Mr. Trump a racist and a fascist, adding more evidence every week, and never once have I felt choked up,” he wrote. “I have never met or spoken to Mr. Bezos.”
The owner also said so in his column. “In the last 11 years, I hope you can find at least one instance in which I have persuaded anyone at the Post to benefit me,” he wrote. “That’s not happening.”
Some newspapers are bucking the trend of non-support. The Oregonian, for example, reversed its decision not to endorse after remaining neutral in 2012 and 2016. “The community’s disappointment at our non-endorsement was loud and clear,” editor Therese Bottomley wrote in response to questions from The Pointer Edmonds.
In Cleveland, Plain Dealer editor Chris Quinn surveyed the editorial board about whether they supported the president. “We are not fooling ourselves into thinking that the president’s support influences voters,” Quinn wrote. “If you’re not trying to influence voters, why publish something that will offend half your audience?”
He cast the decisive vote. The Plain Dealer endorsed Harris. Quinn posed questions to some readers through text. They felt that not supporting them was a betrayal, an act of cowardice, he wrote.
“That was enough for me,” Quinn wrote. “Our obligation is to our readers.”
David Bauder writes about media for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder.
