The editors of the Washington Post ‘killed’ the article of their ‘gender columnist’, plan to completely abolish the role
The Washington Post plans to eliminate its “gender columnist” position after a writer wrote an article that was ultimately rejected by the paper’s editors, Fox News Digital has learned.
Monica Hesse, who made headlines in 2018 by becoming The Post’s first “gender columnist,” won’t keep that title long after her editors “killed” writing a gender column, two sources told Fox News Digital. It is unclear what Hesse wrote in the column and what the editors objected to.
Hesse, currently the paper’s Style columnist, is expected to either be moved to the Opinion section or remain at Style as a reporter, the sources added.
“It’s sad and so unnecessary,” one source told Fox News Digital.
Neither Hesse nor The Washington Post responded to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
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The Washington Post is poised to move Monica Hesse as a “gender columnist” after editors killed an article she wrote. (ERIC BARADAT/AFP via Getty Images; Dan Zak/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
Hesse first joined The Post in 2007 as an intern on the Style team before becoming a feature reporter until he began working as a “gender columnist.” In 2023, she was a Pulitzer Prize Finalist because her columns “convey[ing] the anger and fear that many Americans felt over the loss of abortion rights after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.”
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Her gender-based commentary has also raised eyebrows among conservative critics over the years. In 2022 Hesse accused Florida’s parental rights law removing progressive gender ideology from the classroom as “homophobic and transphobic laws cloaked in neutral language.”
In another pieceshe defended drag queens reading books to children, insisting that “drag queens are not the ones who sexualize drag story hour.”
Washington Post gender columnist Monica Hesse has a history of raising eyebrows among conservative critics. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
In 2023, Hesse accused critics of first ladies Jill Biden and Gisele Fetterman of “sexism” for allowing their spouses to seek office despite their mental disabilities.
“To attack someone who is sick or old just because they are sick or old is beyond the scope of our culture (at least for now), even for those experts whose flexible morals usually find a way to bend around all the barricades of decency.” Hesse wrote at that time. “But by placing the blame on the wives, these commentators are spreading harmful messages against the president and senators while being able to deny the accusations of competence. The commentators aren’t slinging mud at these poor people. They’re just bashing women who should know better. That’s competence, with a bit of sexism , as a treat.”
During the 2024 election cycle, Hesse defended Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz for putting tampons in boys’ school restrooms as governor of Minnesota.
“Any guy who casually said, ‘Oh, you’re on your period? I hid a pad from the bathroom in my backpack in case one of my friends needed it’ — that guy would be king. That guy would be drowning in prom invitations,” she wrote on X.
The Washington Post’s billionaire owner, Jeff Bezos, has previously signaled that his newspaper will turn toward the center, defending his decision to reverse the endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. (SAUL LOEB / AFP) (Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
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The Post’s move to remove its “gender columnist” position could be seen as an ideological pivot toward the center as the liberal paper adjusts to the return of President-elect Donald Trump.
Jeff Bezos, the billionaire owner of The Post, who just days before the election rescinded his newspaper’s endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris, alluded to the reforms in an op-ed defending the endorsement decision.
“Most people believe the media is biased. Anyone who doesn’t see that isn’t paying attention to reality, and those who fight reality lose,” Bezos wrote in October. “Reality is the undefeated champion. It would be easy to blame others for our long and steady decline in credibility (and therefore decline in influence), but a victim mentality will not help. Complaining is not a strategy. We must work harder to control what we can control in order to increase our credibility. “
