However the Put up has struggled to carry on to the industrial success it had reached in the course of the first Trump administration, falling far behind its largest competitor, The New York Occasions. Its viewers has shrunk and monetary losses have ballooned.
“He’s a extremely rational particular person. I believe he was snug shedding $20 million a yr. When it will get to $100 million a yr, I don’t know what his urge for food is for that,” says a former govt who labored intently with Bezos. “I don’t suppose for him it’s like a mission enterprise in the identical manner it will be for [the Graham family] or for the Sulzbergers [who own the New York Times].”
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Robert Miller/The Washington Put up/Getty Pictures
The Washington Put up chief govt Will Lewis solutions staff’ questions final yr. Bezos’ flip towards Trump has alarmed editorial employees, fueling an exodus of expertise and subscribers.
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Robert Miller/The Washington Put up/Getty Pictures
This industrial wrestle occurred on the similar time that Bezos cozied as much as Trump and started intervening on the Opinion part, additional sinking morale throughout the newspaper. At the least a dozen seasoned journalists have left to work for rivals.
Many noticed a direct hyperlink between his muzzling of the newspaper and rewards for his different enterprises. Hours after Bezos spiked the paper’s endorsement of Harris, Blue Origin chief govt David Limp met Trump at a rally in Texas. Former Put up editor-at-large Robert Kagan criticized the assembly as a “quid professional quo.”
Within the newest fracas, veteran journalist Ruth Marcus resigned final week, claiming that chief govt Sir Will Lewis had axed a column she had written criticizing Bezos’ overhaul of the Opinion part. “The Washington Put up I joined, the one I got here to like, is just not The Washington Put up I left,” Marcus stated of the choice.
But for all of the drama within the newsroom, public grievances lodged by senior journalists, and relentless media protection depicting the Put up in disaster, there’s little indication that Bezos is fazed.
“He’s a extremely robust man. He’s completely charming, however he didn’t get the place he was by being sort and mild. In that sense, I don’t know that he’s modified,” says the previous Put up govt. “I keep in mind him speaking concerning the folks he will get for the Amazon board, and he particularly picks individuals who don’t give a shit what different folks suppose. He doesn’t need folks on the board like ‘oh my god, we don’t air situation the warehouses?’ I believe he himself is like that, too.”
In January, greater than 400 Put up journalists signed a letter imploring Bezos to satisfy them about their issues. He didn’t reply.
“He’s taken the group in a sure path and appears decided to try this, for no matter purpose that he hasn’t totally defined,” says Baron, who provides that he has not tried to contact Bezos about his objections.
“Fairly merely, I don’t suppose he cares what I believe.”
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