Washington Post staff summon billionaire owner Jeff Bezos for emergency summit before Trump inauguration

A letter has been sent to Jeff Bezos on behalf of more than 400 Washington Post journalists demanding a meeting with the newspaper’s owner.

Staffers ranging from longtime stalwarts to veteran reporters expressed frustrations with the paper’s leadership, even going so far as to question it outright.

First reported by NPRThe correspondence comes amid a mass exodus of top talent and financial troubles at the once progressive newspaper.

This was obtained on Wednesday by The New York Timesjust over a week after the Postal Service laid off 100 employees. The cuts amounted to 4 percent of the newspaper’s total workforce.

In September, the Post laid off a quarter of the staff at its ArcXP software unit, months after implementing a series of acquisitions in a failed attempt to avoid layoffs.

That same month, the Post’s new publisher and CEO, Will Lewis, a former editor of the British Daily Telegraph, issued a statement to DC office staff about the paper’s dire situation in readership and finances. He ruffled feathers by telling reporters, “People don’t read your stuff.”

Staff unrest intensified when Bezos, 60, broke tradition by blocking The Post’s planned endorsement of Kamala Harris weeks before the election.

A quarter of a million subscribers canceled their subscriptions in response and a number of high-profile journalists resigned. Remaining heavyweights Dan Balz, Carol D. Leonnig and Margaret “Pooh” Shapiro are said to have signed off on the recent meeting requesting a meeting at the Post office.

“You recently wrote that ensuring the long-term success and editorial independence of this newspaper is essential,” the letter began, quoting Bezos’ explanatory op-ed in which he cited “distrust” of the media as a basis for lack of support.

“We agree, and we think you are as proud of The Washington Post as we are,” the letter continued.

“We are deeply alarmed by recent leadership decisions that have led readers to question the integrity of this institution, which has broken from a tradition of transparency, and prompted some of our most senior colleagues to resign.”

The petition then seems to promise that there will be ‘more departures’ [are] menacing,” following the departure of well-known political reporters Michael Scherer and Ashley Parker, both poached by The Atlantic.

“This goes well beyond the issue of presidential approval, which we recognize as the owner’s prerogative.

“This is about maintaining our competitive advantage, rebuilding lost trust and rebuilding a relationship with leadership based on open communication,” it continued, weeks after longtime editor-in-chief Matea Gold also resigned from the New York Times.

“We urge you to come to our office and meet with Post leaders, as you have done in the past, about what happened at The Post.

‘We understand the need for change and are committed to delivering the news in innovative ways. But we need a clear vision that we can believe in.”

The correspondence, written in the run-up to Trump’s fast-approaching presidency, concluded with staffers declaring they were “committed to pursuing independent journalism that holds power accountable.”

They also pledged to “continue reporting the news without fear or favor,” saying, “That will never change.” [and that] nothing will shake our resolve to follow the reporting wherever it leads.”

The note also included a quote from Bezo’s offer when he became owner of The Post in 2013, for a sum of $250 million.

“The Post’s values ​​do not need to change,” he said at the time.

The letter, in turn, ended with the staffers saying, “We urge you to stand with us in reaffirming these values.”

According to NPR Media correspondent David Folkenflik, signatories included Balz, Leonnig and Shapiro — the latter being the widow of Fred Hiatt, the post’s longtime editor-in-chief, who died in 2021.

All have held prominent positions at the Post for decades, with Balz, 78, currently serving as the paper’s chief correspondent. He started there as a reporter in 1978.

Leonnig, meanwhile, has been a staff writer at The Washington Post since 2000 and was part of a reporting team that won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2014 for reporting that shined a light on the NSA’s extensive spying on ordinary Americans.

As for Shapiro, she has been with the paper since the 1980s, including stints as the paper’s subway reporter and co-bureau chief in Tokyo from 1987 to 1990. Today she is one of the newspaper’s most senior editors.

Their coalition — which Folkenflik said included “star journalists,” lesser-known staffers and non-union editors — was formed less than a month after the exodus and also included three prominent opinion section writers: David Hoffman, Molly Roberts and Robert Kagan.

They all quit in direct response to Bezos’ endorsement decision.

White House correspondent Tyler Pager also left late last month, announcing he would return to work at his longtime employer — and the Post’s main rival — The New York Times.

Opinion editor Amanda Katz and her deputy Charles Lane have also since disappeared, along with columnist Jennifer Rubin, who confirmed to CNN on Monday that she and the former would be leaving her job at the newspaper after 14 years.

As for why, she said it was also due to Bezos becoming too friendly with the president-elect.

This all comes as media companies ranging from MSNBC to The Walt Disney Corporation have been criticized for kissing the president-elect’s proverbial ring, while Washington continues to emerge as the biggest story in the world.

Bezos apparently caught wind of this changing tide in the weeks before the election, breaking tradition by blocking The Washington Post’s planned endorsement of Harris in late October.

In it, the 60-year-old said it was the “principled” and “right” decision for the Post not to participate, paving the way for a lucrative deal with Melania Trump announced last week at a cost of $40. million.

The documentary, currently being directed by #MeToo outcast Bret Ratner, will be released in the second half of 2025.

Sources familiar with the matter revealed the amount paid by Amazon to license the rights Puksaying the deal also includes a follow-up docuseries.

It is unclear what Melania will be paid personally for the project, which will air on Prime Video and also be shown in theaters for some time, the insiders said.

Disney and Paramount have also reportedly lost the streaming rights after a bidding war with Amazon. Neither Netflix nor Apple participated, the sources said.