Questions about whether The #WashingtonPost would endorse a candidate…have spread for days. Some people have speculated…that the paper’s #billionaire owner, #JeffBezos, was being cowed by a prospective #Trump admin because his other businesses have many federal government contracts.

Lewis, in his note to the staff, said little about how #WaPo arrived at its decision, adding only that it was not “a tacit endorsement of one candidate, or as a condemnation of another.”

#democracy #FourthEstate

The #WashingtonPost’s editorial writers had already drafted an #endorsement of VP #KamalaHarris for president….

#WaPo’s editorial board had contacted the #Harris campaign & the #Trump campaign to request interviews ahead of its decision to endorse…. Harris declined the interview & the Trump campaign didn’t respond….

WaPo’s decision drew immediate blowback on social media, including from #MartyBaron, the recent editor of WaPo who led the paper through a period of editorial & business success.

“This is #cowardice, w/ #democracy as its casualty,” #MartyBaron said in a post…. He added that #Trump would see it as an invitation to continue to try to intimidate #JeffBezos. “Disturbing #spinelessness at an institution famed for courage.”

#WaPo’s move follows unfurling tumult at The #LATimes, where the head of the editorial board & 2 of its writers have resigned this week to protest the decision by the owner, the #billionaire #PatrickSoonShiong, to block a planned presidential #endorsement.

…The #NewYorkTimes’ editorial board, which operates separately from the newsroom, endorsed #KamalaHarris for president on Sept 30, saying: “It is hard to imagine a candidate more #unworthy to serve as president of the United States than Donald #Trump.” But in August, it said it would stop endorsing candidates in #NY elections, including the #NYC mayoral race.

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media #WashingtonPost #WaPo #LATimes

And straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak:

“An #endorsement of #KamalaHarris had been drafted by The #WashingtonPost editorial page staffers but had yet to be published, acc/to 2 sources briefed on the sequence of events who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. The decision not to publish was made by #WaPo’s owner — #Amazon founder #JeffBezos — acc/to the same sources.”

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media
https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2024/10/25/washington-post-endorsement-president/

“This is #cowardice, a moment of darkness that will leave #democracy as a casualty. Donald Trump will celebrate this as an invitation to further intimidate The Post’s owner, #JeffBezos (& other media owners),” former Post executive editor #MartyBaron, who led the paper while #Trump was president, said in a text message to The Post. “History will mark a disturbing chapter of #spinelessness at an institution famed for courage.”

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media #WashingtonPost #WaPo

In a column published on The #WashingtonPost’s website Friday, #WaPo Publisher #WilliamLewis described the decision as a return to the newspaper’s roots of non-endorsement.

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/25/washington-post-endorsement/

The decision has roiled many on the #editorial staff, which operates independently from The #WashingtonPost’s news staff, a long-standing tradition of American #journalism designed to separate opinion writing from day-to-day #news coverage.

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media #WashingtonPost

More on The #WashingtonPost’s #acquiescence from NPR:

Colleagues learned the news from the #editorial page editor, #DavidShipley, at a tense meeting shortly before #WillLewis' announcement. The meeting was characterized by 2 people w/direct knowledge of discussions….

Shipley had approved an #editorial #endorsement for #KamalaHarris that was being drafted earlier this month, acc/to 3 people w/direct knowledge.

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media #WaPo
https://www.npr.org/2024/10/25/nx-s1-5165353/washington-post-presidential-endorsement-trump-harris

Colleagues were said to be "shocked" & uniformly negative. Editor-at-large #RobertKagan, who has been highly critical of #Trump as #autocratic, told NPR he had #resigned from the #EditorialBoard as a consequence.

Fmr #WashingtonPost Executive Editor Martin Baron, who led the newsroom to acclaim during #Trump's presidency, denounced the decision starkly.

#democracy #FourthEstate #journalism #media #acquiescence #WaPo

The #WashingtonPost Guild, which reps newsroom employees & other staff, posted a msg on X saying it was concerned about mgmt's #interference in the #journalism, considering that the #editorial board already had drafted a stmnt of support for #Harris.

"We are already seeing cancellations from once loyal readers” it said.

On Fri afternoon, furor at #WaPo was such that its chief tech officer directed engineers to block questions about its decision on the paper's own AI site search…

#FourthEstate

…The #WashingtonPost's investigative team has routinely reported on wrongdoing & allegations of illegality by #Trump …& his associates. The #EditorialBoard, which is operated apart from the newsroom, has repeatedly declared that Trump's actions in office & his rhetoric as a candidate have rendered him #unfit for office.

#WaPo earned a #PulitzerPrize for its examination of what Trump did in Jan 2021 to encourage his supporters to deny the formal #certification of President #Biden's #election.

On the campaign trail, #Trump has threatened to exact #vengeance on #journalists & #media outlets should he win the presidency once more.

In particular, he has promised to #jail #reporters who won't identify the source of government #leaks & to strip 3 big TV networks of their licenses to broadcast. (Only local TV stations are actually licensed by federal regulators, not the networks themselves. But the 3 networks own 80 local TV stations between them.)

#democracy #FourthEstate #WashingtonPost

…Even before Fri's announcement, the potential lack of an #editorial drew consternation from #journalists w/in the #WashingtonPost, who see it as a major American publication that needs to weigh in on the most pressing issue of the day.

WaPo owner #Bezos, Amazon founder & one of the world's richest people, has major contracts before the federal govt in his other businesses, w/ #billion-dollar implications affecting Amazon's shipping & cloud computing services as well as his BlueOrigin space co.