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Washington Post update: Winnett withdraws while Lewis hangs on — for now

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On June 21, 2024

In Media

Robert Winnett (via LinkedIn)

Robert Winnett will not be joining The Washington Post as executive editor this fall. The announcement (free link) was made by publisher Will Lewis, who is still at his job even though Winnett pulled out after his and Lewis’ gross breaches of journalistic ethics in the U.K. were revealed by several news outlets, including the Post itself.

I continue to believe Lewis isn’t long for his position, either. Two Pulitzer Prize-winning Post journalists, David Maraniss and Scott Higham, have called on Lewis to leave, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see more in a few days.

Under Lewis’ absurd scheme for reorganizing the newsroom, the current interim executive editor, Matt Murray, who was brought in when Sally Buzbee quit rather than accept a demotion, is supposed to move over to run a “third newsroom” this fall that will comprise social media and, well, stuff, none of which Lewis has clearly defined. Murray, in turn, would be replaced by Winnett.

Instead, Winnett will remain as deputy editor of the Telegraph Media Group in the U.K. Murray, who had been editor-in-chief of The Wall Street Journal, has made a good first impression, according to Poynter’s Tom Jones and other accounts I’ve seen, so perhaps he’ll remain as executive editor. But owner Jeff Bezos needs to do something soon — like maybe today — about the Lewis disaster.

Earlier coverage.

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The Will Lewis scandal at The Washington Post is spinning out of control

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On June 16, 2024

In Media

Will Sally Buzbee return? Photo (cc) 2018 by Collision Conf.

Saturday was the first time I thought that Washington Post publisher Will Lewis might survive the scandal that had erupted over his role in the Murdoch phone-hacking schedule and his subsequent attempts at intimidating people into not reporting on it. By Saturday evening, though, it was clear that not only will he have to go but so will his hand-picked executive editor, Robert Winnett.

In case you missed it, here’s the lead of the latest New York Times report (free link), this one by Justin Scheck and Jo Becker:

The publisher and the incoming editor of The Washington Post, when they worked as journalists in London two decades ago, used fraudulently obtained phone and company records in newspaper articles, according to a former colleague, a published account of a private investigator and an analysis of newspaper archives.

Will Lewis, The Post’s publisher, assigned one of the articles in 2004 as business editor of The Sunday Times. Another was written by Robert Winnett, whom Mr. Lewis recently announced as The Post’s next executive editor.

What a disaster. And it gets worse, as Scheck and Becker recount the ways that Lewis has tried to play down his role in the scandal, including telling the BBC in 2020, “My role was to put things right, and that is what I did.” Now we know he was up to his neck in it. The Times story also reports that Lewis has been less than honest about how he handled a £110,000 payoff to a source.

Just a reminder: executive editor Sally Buzbee, who left the Post a week ago, was not fired; rather, she quit rather than accept a demotion to a new role overseeing social media and new editorial products. What are the odds of her returning triumphantly to the newsroom on Monday? No doubt that would require an apology by owner Jeff Bezos as well as some guaranteed job security. But that would seem to be Bezos’ best option at this point.

Earlier coverage.

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An insightful Times report on Jeff Bezos, Will Lewis and The Washington Post

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On June 15, 2024

In Media

Portrait of Jeff Bezos (cc) 2017 by thierry ehrmann

Some worthwhile insights in this New York Times story (free link) on Jeff Bezos and The Washington Post. According to Times reporters Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson, interim publisher Patty Stonesifer last fall did a thorough scrub of Will Lewis’ involvement in the Murdoch phone-hacking scandal and, according to an anonymous source, “came away satisfied with his explanation and confident that he was the right executive to run The Post.”

Lewis’ miserable attempts to manage the fallout from that scandal, which include reports that he tried to intimidate then-executive editor Sally Buzbee from reporting on it in the Post and that he told NPR media reporter David Folkenflik he could have an interview if he’d agree not to write about it, were apparently not enough to overcome Bezos’ belief that Lewis could be an effective publisher.

Bezos seems especially intrigued by Lewis’ proposal to create a “third newsroom” to include social media and new products, and the Times reports that Bezos pressed Buzbee to accept Lewis’ offer of running that shop. Buzbee declined and left the paper.

I’m intrigued by the third newsroom as well, since the Post desperately needs to find a strategy that involves more than being just like the Times only not as comprehensive. I still wonder if Lewis can overcome his self-inflicted wounds, but he has reportedly adopted a more contrite attitude in dealings with his employees. So we’ll see.

Earlier coverage.

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Lewis keeps digging and demands a bigger shovel

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On June 7, 2024

In Media

Photo (cc) 2022 by Dan Kennedy

Embattled Washington Post publisher Will Lewis not only keeps digging but he’s demanding a bigger shovel. CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy, whose coverage of the Post’s meltdown has been exceptional, writes that Lewis’ response to his own paper following Thursday’s bombshell NPR story has only made things worse — much worse. Darcy writes:

At The Post, according to more than half-dozen staffers I spoke with Thursday, morale has fallen off a cliff since Lewis abruptly ousted Executive Editor Sally Buzbee on Sunday. “It’s as bad as I’ve ever seen it, truly,” one staffer confided in me Thursday, noting that The Post has hit “rough patches” before, but that the stormy atmosphere hanging over the Washington outlet is unprecedented.

In an interview with the Post, Darcy notes, Lewis labeled NPR’s respected media reporter, David Folkenflik, as “an activist not a journalist,” which is just astonishing.

Darcy also ties up another loose thread. After Folkenflik reportedly rejected Lewis’ offer last December for an interview in exchange for not writing about Lewis’ role in the Murdochian phone-hacking scandal, that first interview went instead to Dylan Byers of Puck. Darcy writes: “Byers told me Thursday night that no restrictions were placed around the interview and he would ‘have never agreed to anything like that.’”

Are Lewis’ days numbered? I think so. The Post is taking a terrible hit to its reputation, and owner Jeff Bezos has to realize that Lewis is no longer the right person to rebuild the sagging news outlet — if he ever was. Bezos might see this as a public relations problem rather than a genuine ethical quandary. Well, fine. But it’s a PR disaster that’s not going away as long as Lewis is in charge. And if Lewis goes, what happens to his handpicked editors, Matt Murray and Robert Winnett?

What a mess.

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Media notes: Will Lewis’ unethical ask, Biden is still old and Hub Blog is back

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On June 6, 2024

In Media

Photo (cc) 2016 by Dan Kennedy

Once the mishegas over the shake-up at The Washington Post dies down, we are left with a question: Is publisher Will Lewis the right person to set a new direction for Jeff Bezos’ money-losing, reader-hemorrhaging newspaper? The New York Times has some disturbing news (free link) on that front.

According to Times reporters Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson, executive editor Sally Buzbee clashed with Lewis over a story about new developments in the British tabloid phone-hacking scandal. Lewis had some involvement as an executive in Rupert Murdoch’s media empire, and he reportedly told Buzbee that he didn’t want the story to run. Buzbee ran it anyway. The Times reports that the exchange was a factor, though not the decisive one, in Buzbee’s decision to leave the Post rather than accept a reduced role under Lewis’ plan to reorganize the staff into three newsrooms.

And lest we forget, Max Tani of Semafor reported a couple of weeks ago that the Post’s director of newsletter strategy, Elana Zak, sent out a missive instructing staff members “don’t distribute this story” in its newsletters. At the time, Zak’s email was attributed to some sort of internal mix-up, but the Times story casts that in a new light.

Buzbee, at least, stood up to Lewis and his ethically inappropriate demand. The problem is that his handpicked new editors, Matt Murray and Robert Winnett, may prove to be more malleable.

A flawed WSJ story

The Wall Street Journal has published a lengthy inquiry (free link) into President Biden’s mental acuity that has inflamed liberal critics. I read it with an open mind, but the story, by Annie Linskey and Siobhan Hughes, is based almost entirely on the observations of partisan Republicans like former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who’s quoted on the record, and current Speaker Mike Johnson, who isn’t.

The article, we’re told, is based on interviews with 45 people — but apparently six of those interviews were devoted to what Johnson had told people about a meeting he had with Biden in February. The story also contradicts earlier reporting about McCarthy, who has privately praised Biden’s mental sharpness even while mocking him in public.

One of the most fair-minded, nonpartisan media observers out there is Tom Jones of Poynter Online, so I was curious as to what he would have to say about it. Here’s his take:

Is it a fairly reported story on a pertinent topic? Or is it a pointed piece based pretty much on quotes and opinions from those who don’t want to see Biden elected to a second term?

I’d go with the latter — considering the money quote is from McCarthy, another key anecdote was reported by current Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, and other tales suggesting Biden’s decline are flimsy, at best. (For example, he sometimes talks quietly, he uses notes, and he relies on aides.)

That “money quote” from McCarthy, by the way, is this: “I used to meet with him [Biden] when he was vice president. I’d go to his house. He’s not the same person.”

Despite Murdoch’s ownership, the Journal’s news coverage is generally superb. It was the Journal’s reporting, after all, that led to Donald Trump’s 34 felony convictions last week. You have to wonder how a slanted piece like this passed muster.

Fairly or not, the Journal has raised the stakes for Biden’s June 27 debate with Trump, who, it should be said much more often than it is, is nearly as old as Biden and whose own problems with age-related mental slips tend to play out in public rather than (allegedly) behind closed doors.

Jay Fitzgerald returns

Veteran journalist Jay Fitzgerald, one of the original Boston bloggers, has revived Hub Blog (via Contrarian Boston). It looks like Jay is mainly writing an old-fashioned link blog with a few longer posts on the turmoil at The Washington Post.

I started writing an early version of this blog in 2002, shortly after Hub Blog launched. I was actually doing it by hand — I had no idea there was this thing called blogging software that automated the process of date-stamping, archiving older posts, adding permalinks and the like until Jay asked me, “What are you using.” He led me to Blogspot, though I’ve been using WordPress since 2005.

Anyway, it’s good to have Jay back in harness.

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Post notes: Buzbee’s departure, diversity concerns and a squishy-soft profile

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On June 4, 2024

In Media

Sally Buzbee. Photo (cc) 2018 by Collision Conf.

I’m reading everything I can find about the still-unfolding story of what’s next at The Washington Post, and I think it makes sense to hold back until the picture comes more clearly into focus. Here, though, are a few bullet points of note:

• It sounds like Sally Buzbee could have stayed as executive editor, at least for a few months, if she’d been willing to accept the reduced role that publisher Will Lewis envisions under his three-newsrooms idea. New York Times reporters Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson report that Buzbee told senior editors in advance of her departure, “I would have preferred to stay to help us get through this period, but it just got to the point where it wasn’t possible.”

• Lewis presided over a staff meeting Monday that devolved into a “shit show,” according to Matt Fuller and Tara Golshan of NOTUS. Particularly outspoken was political reporter Ashley Parker, who pointed out, “Now we have four white men running the newsroom.” Lewis responded, “I’ve got to do better.” Well, this was his chance, and now all the top jobs have been filled. NOTUS, by the way,  is part of the Allbritton Journalism Institute, begun recently by Robert Allbritton, the former publisher of Politico, part of a family whose members are ancient rivals of the Post going back to the long-gone Washington Star.

• Check out this squishy-soft Post feature on the new top editors, Matt Murray and Robert Winnett. I don’t want to judge the Post on one article, and in fact this story on Buzbee’s departure is straightforward and reasonably tough. But I’m reminded of some of the brutally candid stories the Post produced after Jeff Bezos announced in August 2013 that he was buying the paper. As I wrote in my 2018 book “The Return of the Moguls”:

Indeed, within days of the announcement that he would buy the paper, the Post published an in-depth examination of Bezos and Amazon that could fairly be described as warts and all — he was described as “ruthless” and a “bully” in his dealings with competitors and a boss who was known for launching “tirades” that “humiliated colleagues.” An infamous story was repeated about Amazon stationing an ambulance outside one of its Pennsylvania warehouses during a heat wave rather than installing air conditioning…. Shel Kaphlan, Bezos’s first employee, who left Amazon after his role within the company was marginalized, was quoted as saying, “I saw him just completely destroy people on several occasions.” Kaphlan added that he felt “nauseous” at the prospect of Bezos owning the Post and the possibility that he would convert it “into a corporate libertarian mouthpiece.” If there is an example of newspaper reporters’ sucking up to the new boss, well, this was surely its opposite.

As is his custom, Bezos refused to cooperate with the team of reporters who worked on that story. But the national investigative reporter Kimberly Kindy, who was among those journalists, told me there were no repercussions from Bezos after publication. “I don’t think that we have shied away from covering him. And he certainly has invited us to,” she said.

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Jeff Bezos is reinventing The Washington Post — again. And this time he’s on his own.

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On June 3, 2024

In Local News

Jeff Bezos. Painting (cc) 2017 by thierry ehrmann.

Having tracked the rise of The Washington Post under owner Jeff Bezos, executive editor Marty Baron and chief technologist Shailesh Prakash in my 2018 book “The Return of the Moguls,” I’ve watched its dispiriting decline with sadness. On Sunday, that decline was underscored by Sally Buzbee’s departure as executive editor. CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy has the story.

Lest we forget, Bezos did not choose Baron and Prakash; rather, he inherited them from Graham family ownership after he bought the paper in 2013 for $250 million. And though Bezos had the good sense to keep them and give them the resources they needed, it was their vision that created a great digital, nationally focused news organization that was positioned perfectly for the rise of Trump. Maybe an early warning sign was that when Bezos did get to make a big hire, he chose Ronald Reagan apparatchik Fred Ryan as publisher. As Baron makes clear in his book “Collision of Power,” Ryan did not prove to be an inspired choice.

Since Donald Trump left office, it’s been nothing but a downhill slide for the Post, which, according to the new publisher, Will Lewis, lost $77 million last year and about half its audience since 2020. Was that entirely the fault of Buzbee, a former Associated Press executive editor who took the Post’s helm after Baron retired in early 2021? Of course not. But it all happened on her watch, so it’s not a surprise that she’s leaving.

As Poynter media reporter Tom Jones points out, it’s not 100% clear that Buzbee was fired. It’s possible that she decided she wanted nothing to do with Lewis’ recently articulated vision, which includes having “AI everywhere in our newsroom,” according to Semafor media reporter Max Tani. Ugh.

The new executive team sets off some alarm bells. Lewis is a former publisher of Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal who reportedly was involved in helping Murdoch clean up his tabloids’ phone-hacking scandal in the U.K. a dozen years ago, according to David Folkenflik of NPR. Buzbee will be replaced on a temporary basis by Matt Murray, a former editor-in-chief of the Journal. After the 2024 election, Murray will slide over to a newly created position creating service and social media journalism while the main news product will be under the direction of Robert Winnett, currently deputy editor of The Telegraph Media Group, a right-wing news organization. Media critic Dan Gillmor wrote on Mastodon:

The Washington Post is about to lurch sharply to the right politically as former Murdoch apparatchik solidifies his grip on the organization. Current editor Buzbee is out, and he’s bringing in people from Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal and the Telegraph (right-wing UK news org).

I’m willing to wait and see, in part because The Wall Street Journal remains a great newspaper notwithstanding its editorial page, whose right-wing orientation precedes Murdoch’s ownership. I’m deeply concerned about what Lewis has in mind with his artificial intelligence initiative, though.

For the second time since he bought it in 2013, Jeff Bezos is faced with the challenge of reinventing The Washington Post. He succeeded spectacularly the first time, with years of growth, profitability and influence. This time, though, he’s doing it with people he chose himself — and there are caution signs all over the place.

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Despite warning signs, Lewis may prove to be an inspired choice as Post publisher

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On November 6, 2023

In Media

Will Lewis (photo via LinkedIn)

The Washington Post has named a new publisher to replace Fred Ryan, who left earlier this year amid widening losses, falling circulation and a reported rift with executive editor Sally Buzbee. Ryan will be succeeded by Will Lewis, and there are some flashing lights we ought to pay attention to.

For one thing, Lewis was knighted by King Charles III on the recommendation of Boris Johnson. For another, he is a former top lieutenant to Rupert Murdoch, although he denies that he and Murdoch are close. Weirdly, a Post profile of Lewis says that “Lewis disagrees with media descriptions of him as a former ‘Murdoch lieutenant,’” but it’s a simple fact. It doesn’t mean that he still speaks to Murdoch or that he doesn’t have his own set of values.

Lewis is the founder, CEO and publisher of a project called The News Movement, which the Post describes as “a social-first media business providing nonpartisan news to Gen Z.” The homepage offers BuzzFeed-style clickbait, but Lewis also has a background in serious journalism.

In other words, there are warning signs, but Lewis may turn out to be an inspired choice. That said, Post owner Jeff Bezos’ hiring record is mixed. Ryan always struck me as not quite right for the job, something confirmed by former executive editor Marty Baron in his book “Collision of Power.” Among Ryan’s last acts was presiding over the death of the Post’s gaming vertical, one of the few features the paper offered that appealed to a younger readership.

Bezos’ pick for editorial page editor, David Shipley, has not improved the Post’s opinion section, which, with few exceptions, has been dismal for many years. The jury is still out on Buzbee. She was well-regarded in her previous job as executive editor of The Associated Press. Her performance at the Post strikes me as solid, but I’m not sure what her vision is. Perhaps her tense relationship with Ryan held her back.

Final fun fact: The New York Times beat the Post in breaking the news about Lewis’ hiring. Yes, I know it can be difficult to report on your own institution, but good grief.

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Book review: Marty Baron has written a plea for journalism that isn’t afraid to tell the truth

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On October 27, 2023

In Media

Photo (cc) 2017 by Álvaro García Fuentes

For more than eight years, The Washington Post experienced a second golden age. From late 2013, when Amazon founder Jeff Bezos bought the storied paper for $250 million, through the early months of 2021, when Donald Trump left the White House and a new administration began to settle in, the Post was firing on all cylinders. Thanks to Bezos’ strategic investments in technology and an expanded news report, the Post emerged as a real competitor to The New York Times for the first time since the 1970s.

That second golden age also overlapped with Martin Baron’s time as executive editor of the Post. In his new book, “Collision of Power: Trump, Bezos, and The Washington Post,” Baron tells the story of those years, offering a behind-the-scenes look at the end of the legendary Graham era; how Bezos quickly transformed a shrinking, mostly regional newspaper into a national digital media outlet; and the challenge of covering Trump, whom Baron frankly, and repeatedly, calls an “authoritarian.”

I’ve covered Marty Baron off and on for years, back when he was editor of The Boston Globe and I was the media columnist for The Boston Phoenix, and later when I was reporting on the Post for my 2018 book, “The Return of the Moguls: How Jeff Bezos and John Henry Are Remaking Newspapers for the Twenty-First Century.” Baron is both accessible and accountable, but he can also be intimidating and a bit defensive. He deserves his reputation as the best editor of his era, not just at the Times but at the Globe and, before that, the Miami Herald.

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The gap between the NY Times and the WashPost continues to widen

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On October 11, 2023

In Media

Two consecutive headlines in Nieman Lab’s daily newsletter Tuesday drove home the growing gap between The New York Times and The Washington Post. The first: “The Washington Post is reducing its workforce by 240 positions.” The second: “The New York Times opinion section has tripled its size since 2017.”

I’ve written about this before, including a suggestion I made last year that the Post should reconnect with local news. As someone who covered the early years of the Post’s revival under Jeff Bezos, I find the current situation sad. Both the Post and the Times flourished during the Trump presidency, but the Times has continued to soar in the post-Trump years (yes, I know we’re not really in the post-Trump years) while the Post has sputtered, losing money and circulation.

We need two great general-interest national newspapers. If the Post is going to get back in the race, it needs to find a way to differentiate itself from the Times. For a few years, the Post difference was a tougher, more truth-telling brand of political coverage, but these days both papers seem pretty much the same. I don’t blame Sally Buzbee, who succeeded the legendary Marty Baron as executive editor. The vision — and the resources — have to come from the very top.

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