The Washington Post will not endorse the race for the White House for the first time since the 1980s

Updated October 25, 2024 at 3:27 pm ET

Even though the presidential race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris is neck and neck, Washington Post. has decided not to endorse the president for the first time in 36 years, the publisher and CEO announced on Friday.

“We are going back to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates,” wrote Will Lewis opinion piece published on the newspaper’s website. He referred to the newspaper’s policies in the decades leading up to 1976, in the wake of the Watergate scandal in which Lent she broke down and supported Democratic candidate Jimmy Carter. One last time Lent According to a search of the archives, she did not support a presidential candidate in the 1988 general election.

Colleagues learned the news from editorial page editor David Shipley during a tense meeting shortly before Lewis’ announcement. The meeting was characterized by the presence of two people with direct knowledge of the discussions on the condition of anonymity in order to comment on internal matters.

Shipley approved an editorial opinion for Harris that was being prepared earlier this month, according to three people with direct knowledge. He told associates that the endorsement decision was being reviewed by billionaire owner Jeff Bezos. This is the owner’s privilege and is common practice.

On Friday, Shipley said he told other newsroom members on Thursday that management had decided there would be no consent, even though Shipley had known about the decision for some time. He added that he “owns” this result. The reason given was the desire to create an “independent space” in which the newspaper would not tell people who to vote for.

Colleagues were said to be “shocked” and unanimously negative. Editor-in-Chief Robert Kaganwho has been highly critical of Trump as an autocrat, told NPR that he resigned from the editorial board as a result.

Ex Washington Post Office Executive editor Martin Baron, who enjoyed editorial acclaim during Trump’s presidency, slammed the decision.

“This is cowardice, a moment of darkness that will leave democracy as a casualty,” Baron said in a statement to NPR. “Donald Trump will celebrate this as an invitation to further intimidate The Post owner Jeff Bezos (and other media owners). “History will mark a disturbing chapter of spinelessness in an institution renowned for courage.”

The Washington Post Guild, which represents newsroom and other staff, posted a message on X expressing concern about management interference in journalism, given that the newsroom had already prepared a statement of support for Harris.

“We are already seeing churn from once-loyal readers.” statement he said.

On Friday afternoon, there was confusion on the street Washington Post Office was that the CTO ordered engineers to block questions about the newspaper’s decision to search for artificial intelligence sites, according to internal correspondence reviewed by NPR.

Lent Company spokespeople declined to comment beyond Lewis’ statement to readers.

Trump often attacks news outlets

A similar decision according to Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong led to the resignation this week of the newspaper’s editorial editor and two editorial board members. Soon-Shiong said he asked the newsroom to produce a “factual analysis” of Trump and Harris’s policies and plans. In her resignation letter, editorial page editor Mariel Garza said the decision made the newspaper appear “cowardly and hypocritical” — given its past reporting and editorials about Trump.

The Lentthe investigative team regularly reports on abuses and allegations of illegality by former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, and his associates. The editorial board, which operates outside the newsroom, has repeatedly stated that Trump’s actions in office and his rhetoric as a candidate make him unfit to hold office.

She particularly focused on what he did in January 2021 to encourage his supporters to refuse to formally certify President Biden’s election.

During the campaign, Trump threatened journalists and the media with retaliation if he won the presidency again.

In particular, he promised to jail reporters who fail to identify the source of government leaks and to strip three major television stations of their broadcasting licenses. (In fact, only local television stations, not the networks themselves, are licensed by federal regulators.) However, a total of 80 local television stations are licensed.)

Book: Bezos thought differently in 2016

Possibility that Lent can hold approval was first reported by Oliver Darcy Newsletter Status. Even before Friday’s announcement, the potential lack of an editorial caused consternation among industry journalists Lentwho see it as an important American publication that should address the most pressing issues of today.

Lent owner Bezos, Amazon’s founder and one of the world’s richest men, has large contracts with the federal government for other business operations, with multibillion-dollar ramifications for Amazon’s shipping and cloud computing businesses, as well as for his space company Blue Origin.

In January, Bezos hired Lewis, who has a significant conservative following, as publisher and CEO. Lewis played the same role for Rupert Murdoch Wall Street Journal; he served as the editor of a London magazine Telegraphclosely associated with the Tory party; and was a consultant to Conservative Boris Johnson when Johnson was British Prime Minister.

Aides told NPR that Bezos chose Lewis in part because of his ability to get along with influential conservatives, including Murdoch.

In his memories Power clashBaron wrote that then-publisher Fred Ryan was reluctant to endorse the race that pitted Trump against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016.