Jeff Bezos Cracks Down on the Washington Post

Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez at a Met Gala after-party in New York on May 6. Photo: Nina Westervelt/Redux

Even before 250,000 digital readers unsubscribed from the Washington Post in protest, the paper was on track to lose at least as much money as it lost last year: $77 million. A deputy managing editor shared the figure in a recent meeting with reporters and editors, per multiple sources. The editor did not say what the added impact of the non-endorsement exodus would be, according to those present. “Mind-blowing,” as one staffer put it. “The level of anger is through the roof, and fear is also through the roof. There’s huge concern that Bezos is going to pull the plug.”

That doesn’t seem likely, at least in the near term. Instead, owner Jeff Bezos — and his already controversial publisher pick, Will Lewis — seems determined to fix the paper, whether the current staff likes it or not. Meanwhile, there has yet to be an official acknowledgment of the 250,000 canceled subscriptions that came in response to Bezos spiking a planned Kamala Harris endorsement shortly before the election, a figure first reported by NPR and later confirmed by the Post’s own media reporter. “The top stories that do well convert 200 readers to subscribers,” a staffer noted. “You’re doing your best work, hoping you convert 200 subscribers. And we lost 250,000 through naïveté and poor decision-making.” (A Post spokesperson declined to comment on subscription numbers and personnel matters, including hiring.)

Lewis, a longtime lieutenant of Rupert Murdoch’s, came in hot. He seemingly sidelined Sally Buzbee, the executive editor he inherited, by trying to put her in charge of a newly invented “third newsroom” (focused on service journalism and social media, among other innovations) while planning on bringing in a friend from the U.K., Robert Winnett, to take her old job overseeing the legacy newsroom. But Buzbee, sensing a demotion, quit, and questions about the Winnett Fleet Street way of doing things caused him to step back, leaving the newsroom under the temporary control of another previous Lewis colleague, the former Wall Street Journal editor Matt Murray, through the end of the election.

Now Murray is angling for a version of the classic top newsroom job, overseeing both newsrooms, new and old. And he has moved his family to D.C. But there’s no guarantee he’ll get it. The search for the job is underway and expected to conclude by the end of the year. Patty Stonesifer, a longtime Bezos confidante who served as interim Post CEO before Lewis came aboard, is involved in the process, I’m told, along with Lewis and Bezos. Candidates delivered memos last week. The other internal candidate is managing editor Matea Gold. (The Post approached some alumni — former managing editor Steven Ginsberg, who is currently running The Athletic, and Kevin Merida, a former Post managing editor who had spent 22 years at the paper before a three-year stint running the Los Angeles Times — early on in the search process, but neither were interested.)

Staff are mixed on Murray. He came in and instantly seemed more engaged in the journalism than Buzbee — talkative in news meetings, shooting notes about headlines — which was a big and welcome change. But several staffers told me he was, frustratingly to them, a company man during the endorsement mess, telling staff in a meeting that he didn’t know how many subscribers were lost and to buck up for the changes ahead. “Completely the wrong message,” one staffer said. “The message should be ‘We’re not doing anything different journalistically, and I’m going to be out there defending you guys.’” The journalists were looking for someone to rally around — as they have been since Marty Baron left — and Murray instead, in their view, stuck close to the boss.

Gold, on the other hand, isn’t angling to also oversee the third newsroom — the first is apparently enough for her — an outcome that would make many journalists happy. She is beloved by reporters. But several staffers I spoke to think it’s unlikely. “If they were going to give it to her, why wouldn’t they have done it when they brought in Matt?” asked one. Gold is a champion of what the Post has been — she has been there for over a decade — and Lewis et al. seem to think the paper has to be something else these days. Not that they have presented a very clear plan for what that is.

There are also external candidates competing for the top job, and I’m told Timesman Cliff Levy, a former masthead member who is currently the deputy publisher of The Athletic and Wirecutter, is one of them.

Two days after the election, Lewis congratulated staff on their coverage and, in the same breath, told them that they had to return to the office five days a week starting next year. The policy — the same order that employees at Amazon, also owned by Bezos, got in September — will kick in for all employees on June 2, and managers must be back full time by February 3. Internally, the Washington Post Guild is, unsurprisingly, pushing back against the policy, jumping into organizing mode and flooding public Slack channels with demands for a town hall with Lewis. But many senior staffers I spoke to are less upset about the actual RTO policy and more about the timing of it, amid unresolved questions about the paper’s leadership and how it will cover the incoming Trump administration — a herculean task for any newsroom. The new office policy “felt punitive,” one staffer said, “like a response to the outcry to them driving us in the ditch with that lack of endorsement. And if that wasn’t the intention, then they certainly missed the boat on the optics of that, too.”

“These aren’t changes that will help us compete in the 21st century,” one staffer said, recalling how Lewis, who himself has a questionable business record, told the newsroom that “people are not reading your stuff” and that its “audience has halved in recent years” back in June. “He has not asked for a single change that in any way seems designed to improve our business plan” and instead “has contempt and derision for the newsroom.”

Currently, Post staff are expected to come in three days a week, though there’s been little effort to enforce that. Some people who were given exemptions from the last return-to-office mandate are now being told their exemptions are voided. It’s unclear how strictly the new policy will be enforced, though one part of a FAQ document recently posted to the Post’s internal HR portal might be some indication. Question: “What would you say to a person who does not wish to return to a five-day-a-week policy?” Answer: “If an employee decides they do not wish to return to work at the Post on a five-day-a-week office schedule, we understand, and will accept their resignation.”

Some of the Post’s most marketable journalists are looking to get ahead of that, seeking out opportunities at other outlets even as the grind of the new Trump administration begins.