New York
The Gentleman Report
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The Washington Publish on Tuesday laid off kind of 100 staff throughout its industry department, the most recent indication of the newspaper’s monetary woes after subscribers and staffers revolted over proprietor Jeff Bezos’s determination to dam an endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris.
The cuts amounted to kind of 4% of the newsletter’s team of workers and didn’t have an effect on the newsroom, a spokesperson for the Publish mentioned. The scoop, which was once first reported within the Standing publication, comes because the beleaguered newspaper has hemorrhaged a number of high-profile reporters in fresh weeks and most sensible applicants pulled out of the operating for the Publish’s govt editor process.
“The Washington Publish is continuous its transformation to fulfill the wishes of the trade, construct a extra sustainable long term and succeed in audiences the place they’re,” a Publish spokesperson informed The Gentleman Report. “Adjustments throughout our industry purposes are all in carrier of our better objective to very best place The Publish for the long run.”
The Publish’s monetary woes are not anything new. When Will Lewis, the Publish’s writer and leader govt, was once named to the highest process in November 2023, the storied paper was once already reeling from the layoffs, readership decline, and excessive bills that experience hounded all the trade. But, the level to which the Publish’s coffers were sapped become obvious in Would possibly, when Lewis printed the paper had misplaced $77 million in 2023.
“To talk candidly,” Lewis mentioned in a Would possibly assembly, “we’re in a hollow, and we’ve been for a while.”
Whilst Lewis introduced a plan to proper the send on the time, the Publish has since waded into deeper waters. Lower than two weeks sooner than the November election, Bezos, the billionaire Amazon founder who got the Publish in 2013 for $250 million, blocked the paper’s endorsement of Harris, breaking with a decades-long custom and ensuing within the resignation of 3 editorial board staffers. On the time, Bezos defended the transfer, noting in an October op-ed that “presidential endorsements do not anything to tip the scales of an election.”
Talking with Andrew Ross Sorkin on the Occasions’ DealBook Summit, Bezos mentioned “it was once the suitable determination,” including that he was once “proud” of the selection.
“The merit I deliver to the Publish is when they want monetary sources, I’m to be had,” Bezos joked on degree. “I’m the doting mother or father in that regard.”
Whilst Bezos isn’t the one billionaire media proprietor to dam an endorsement all the way through the 2024 election cycle, the Publish’s funds have suffered from the transfer. Within the days after Bezos blocked the endorsement, over 250,000 Publish readers canceled their subscriptions, kind of 10% of the paper’s virtual subscribers.
Inside of The Publish, the transfer ignited turmoil, resulting in a number of fresh high-profile defections.
In December, Matea Gold, the Publish’s managing editor, shared she was once leaving the Publish for The New York Occasions. Ultimate week, The Atlantic poached political newshounds Ashley Parker and Michael Scherer, the Occasions scooped up White Space reporter Tyler Pager, the Wall Boulevard Magazine nabbed investigative politics reporter Josh Dawsey, and Puck poached veteran journalist Leigh Ann Caldwell.
And, on Friday, Ann Telnaes, the Publish’s Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist, very publicly resigned from the opening after the newspaper refused to submit a satirical caricature depicting Bezos bending the knee sooner than Trump.
The strikes come as Bezos makes an attempt to fix his courting with the incoming president, eating ultimate month with Trump at Mar-a-Lago and creating a $1 million donation to his inaugural fund.
On Sunday, Amazon mentioned it could unencumber a documentary about first girl Melania Trump on its Top Video platform later this yr. Melania Trump will function an govt manufacturer of the mission, signaling that the documentary is being made along with her complete participation — and editorial keep watch over.
