Washington Post ‘rudderless’ as Bezos’ paper swallows layoffs, talent exodus ahead of Trump’s second term

2025 has already turned into a tough year for The Washington Post as a multi-year identity crisis and financial struggles continue to plague the Jeff Bezos-owned newspaper ahead of a second Trump presidency.

While newsroom tensions and financial difficulties have persisted, they have reached new heights after Bezos named Will Lewis as The Post’s publisher and CEO. Tasked with revitalizing the newspaper’s business model, Lewis had some choice words for his staff at a June 2024 meeting following the ousting of executive editor Sally Buzbee.

“We’re losing huge amounts of money. Your audience has cut in half in the last few years. People aren’t reading your stuff… I can’t sugar coat it anymore,” Lewis said at the time.

WASHINGTON POST BEGINS LAYOFFS, 4 PERCENT WORKFORCE REDUCTION

Fast forward to 2025, and Lewis has become estranged from his newsroom.

“The company feels rudderless right now,” said one employee Fox News Digital. “Will Lewis has effectively disappeared since his infamous ‘nobody reads your stuff’ meeting last year, he hasn’t appointed a permanent executive editor, if he has a business plan, he hasn’t communicated it to his employees, or the public, or anyone, it seems, except [Puck reporter] Dylan Byers… without clarity on when and in which direction the company is going.”

The staff was outraged as they speculated that Lewis was the source of Puck’s Dylan Byers coverage, telling Fox News Digital “that’s apparently how Lewis prefers to communicate with his staff.”

“In the last six months, maybe more, we’ve heard from Will Lewis exactly once — in his bizarre passive-aggressive post-election email announcing his return to office,” the staffer said.

Last summer, Lewis named former Wall Street Journal editor-in-chief Matt Murray as acting executive editor until a permanent replacement for Buzbee is found. But an exhaustive search resulted in no one taking the position, leaving Lewis to name Murray as the new permanent executive editor, according to a recent report by Byers.

Lewis’s outspoken comments may have irritated his staffbut Bezos’ decision to end The Post’s endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris just days before the election caused an uproar not only in the newsroom but among readers as well. The Post was already poised to lose a whopping $77 million by the end of the year, but that hit doesn’t even count the staggering 250,000 people who reportedly canceled their subscriptions due to lack of support.

WAPO STAFF NOT SURE PAPERS CAN BE RECOVERED AS BEZOSA-OWNED OUTLET DROPS 250,000 SUBSCRIBERS DUE TO RECEIPT FISCAL

Many critics, inside and outside the newspaper, interpreted Bezos’s decision as a concession to then-candidate and now President-elect Donald Trump.

Paul Farhi, a former media writer for The Washington Post who left in 2023 as a result of a massive company-wide buyout, called Bezos’ move the “most catastrophic” management decision in the paper’s history.

“Morale is very low, of course,” Farhi told Fox News Digital. “Things wouldn’t be great if the paper had a management that made all the right moves. But it amazes me that they made a series of terrible moves in response to worsening, greater economic conditions, which made things much worse.”

Postmen remain concerned by the exodus of talent in recent weeks “with no apparent effort to stem the bleeding”, current staff said. The non-confirmation led to the resignation of editor-in-chief Robert Kagan and several members of the editorial board. In the weeks that followed, several high-profile staffers announced departures to other papers, including reporters Josh Dawsey, Ashley Parker, Michael Scherer, Tyler Page and LeeAnn Caldwell, columnist Charles Lane and veteran editor Matea Gold. Fox News Digital has also learned that The Post’s health and science editor Stephen Smith is leaving for The New York Times.

Farhi called the departures a “vote of no confidence” in publisher Will Lewis.

“These departures are also a vote of no confidence in him and the paper’s management,” he said. “You know, politics isn’t the only thing that the Washington Post does, but it’s a big part of the franchise. And when you lose the core, you know, some of the best people that you’ve developed over the years to be part of that franchise, it’s really demoralizing and it really undermines the whole enterprise. You know , they will find people again.

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What could also prompt the exits is the ideological battle that appears to be taking shape within The Post. Like Semafor’s Ben Smith recently wrotemany employees have “sold” the idea that The Post’s mission is to be “the newspaper of #Resistance”. However, Bezos himself alluded to the newspaper’s reforms in an op-ed defending his approval decision.

“Most people believe the media is biased. Anyone who doesn’t see that is not paying attention to reality, and those who fight reality lose,” Amazon founder 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 won’t help. Complaining is not a strategy. We need to do more to control what we can control in order to increase our credibility. “

Bezos, like several Silicon Valley billionaires, has extended olive branches to President-elect Trump since his victory. Bezos met him at Mar-a-Lago last month and donated $1 million to his inaugural fund. Amazon Prime also announced this week that it will be documentary film production giving an “unprecedented behind-the-scenes look” at first lady Melania Trump, which will be released worldwide both in theaters and via streaming.

Pulitzer Prize-winning Post cartoonist Ann Telnaes mocked Bezos by depicting him and others groveling at Trump’s feet in a cartoon the editors refused to publish. She resigned in protest last week.

The Washington Post’s in-house media critic Erik Wemple spoke out against the new policy implemented by Murray, who said the paper should not be covering it when asked about the lack of coverage of Telnaes’ resignation.

“I could not have renounced that policy more forcefully,” Wemple reacted on Monday. “The Post’s willingness over the years to cover its own failings and scandals has helped set it apart from many news organizations that refuse to abide by the same rules that hold politicians, CEOs, professional athletes, etc. And that’s something, I believe, that subscribers have appreciated.”

In addition to the recent drama in the newsroom, The Washington Post this week introduced layoffs, affecting about 4% of the entire company, targeting its business divisions, while its reporters were spared.

Despite their personal horror at the newspaper’s current situation, the two Postmen tell Fox News Digital they don’t want to leave.

“I’d like to try driving it,” said one. “I love the company, I love the people I work with and for.”

WAPO WRITER USES NEW PAPER POLICY NOT COVERED: ‘COULDN’T DELIVER STRONGER’

Staff urged Lewis to “treat his employees like adults.”

“Tell us his vision for the company, explain his path to get there, and hire a talented and inspiring executive editor to get us there. Do your job. Stop letting the company become stale and stop the talent hemorrhage,” they said.

One former employee has lashed out at the “self-inflicted” damage done by their once-beloved employer.

“It’s very sad to see how quickly everything that was built was dismantled,” said the former Postie veteran.

The former employee called out Lewis and Murray, insisting that “neither is willing to take a stand” against Bezos. They blasted Murray’s new policy on Post reporters not covering themselves, predicting that the policy would soon apply to not covering Amazon.

“It is truly tragic,” they said.

The Washington Post did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

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David Rutz of Fox News contributed to this report.