Dramatic cuts to the Washington Post are being met with outrage as employees and the broader journalism community try to understand how such a storied institution could unravel so quickly.
Why it matters: Continued success at rival papers, including the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, suggests the Post's challenges are self-inflicted.
State of play: The perceived lack of empathy from top management and the company's billionaire owner Jeff Bezos is compounding the fury.
- As of Wednesday night, neither CEO Will Lewis nor Bezos had made any public statements about the cuts, which will impact roughly 30% of the Post's staff.
"This ranks among the darkest days in the history of one of the world's greatest news organizations," the Post's celebrated former editor-in-chief Marty Baron said in a lengthy statement.
- The Post's challenges, he said, "were made infinitely worse by ill-conceived decisions that came from the very top —from a gutless order to kill a presidential endorsement 11 days before the 2024 election to a remake of the editorial page that now stands out only for its moral infirmity."
"We are witnessing a murder at The Washington Post," wrote longtime former Post reporter Ashley Parker. "This massacre will be the enduring legacy of Jeff Bezos and Will Lewis and the leadership who stood by."
By the numbers: In a statement Wednesday shortly after the cuts were announced, the Washington Post Guild said the Post's workforce has shrunk by roughly 400 people in the last three years.
- Wednesday's cuts are estimated to have impacted hundreds of people from the Post's newsrooms, and many more from the Post's business and tech units.
- Around 75 people were laid off from Arc XP, the paper's software services arm, sources told Axios.
Between the lines: Without any acknowledgment about the cuts from the Post's top brass, former Post employees and executives have scrambled to fill the void with articles and analysis aiming to explain the leadership failure that led to the paper's demise.
- Don Graham, the longtime former publisher of the Post, reached out to reporters directly on social media to offer reassurance and job recommendations.
Context: The Post's financial struggles predate Lewis' tenure, but have been compounded by a series of unforced errors over the past two years.
- Lewis inherited a paper that was losing tens of millions of dollars, but the paper continued to bleed even more money as it pivoted its focus away from local and international reporting to broader national coverage and social publishing efforts meant to appeal to a wider audience.
- The Post has tried to experiment with new ways to connect with younger audiences using artificial intelligence and focusing more on creators, but those efforts have yet to meaningfully contribute to the company's bottom line.
- Lewis' personal tensions with the Post newsroom and Bezos' opinion section directives also contributed to a talent exodus that have compounded the Post's business problems.
The big picture: During the first decade of his ownership tenure at the Post, Bezos was considered to be a steward of quality journalism, prompting hope that philanthropic media ownership could address the financial crisis upending the news industry.
- But he, like other billionaire businessmen, has carefully shifted his public tone in the Trump era.
- That shift represents one of the fundamental risks of news organizations being bought by individuals with business interests outside of news.
What to watch: Journalism experts have suggested that Bezos donate the Post to a charity as a way to acknowledge his ownership conflicts of interest while doing the right thing for the longevity of the paper.
- The remarkable turnaround at the Philadelphia Inquirer serves as an example of how owners can rewrite the history of their legacy by letting go of something that's not working, and positioning it for better success long term as a nonprofit.
What's next: Guild members at the Post are planning a rally at noon Thursday in front of the paper's office in Washington D.C.
