Amazon.com Inc. founder Jeff Bezos, the owner of the Washington Post, said the newspaper’s decision to stop endorsing presidential candidates addresses a “credibility gap” afflicting the media industry.
“Most people believe the media is biased,” Bezos said in an essay published on the Post’s website. “Anyone who doesn’t see this is paying scant attention to reality.”
Bezos also said the Post’s action was unrelated to former President Donald Trump’s meeting with executives from Blue Origin, another of his businesses, on the day of the announcement. The meeting was scheduled quickly and without Bezos’ knowledge.
“I sighed when I found out, because I knew it would provide ammunition to those who would like to frame this as anything other than a principled decision,” he wrote.
The Post’s publisher, William Lewis, announced on Oct. 25 that the newspaper would no longer choose sides in presidential races, something it has done regularly since 1978. Editorial staff had been prepared to endorse Trump’s Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.
The decision set off a firestorm of criticism, both inside and outside of the newspaper. Multiple editors and writers resigned. As many as 200,000 subscribers, or 8% of the total, canceled, National Public Radio reported. A spokesperson for the Post declined to comment.
Among those criticizing the decision were Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the reporters whose reporting on the Watergate scandal for the Post led President Richard Nixon to resign.
Marty Baron, a former executive editor of the paper, told NPR on Monday that while he doesn’t disagree with a newspaper’s choice to not make endorsements, he believes the timing of the Post’s announcement was wrong.
“If this decision had been made three years ago, two years ago, maybe even a year ago, that would’ve been fine,” Baron said. “This was made within a couple of weeks of the election, and there was no substantive serious deliberation with the editorial board of the paper. It was clearly made for other reasons, not for reasons of high principle.”
In his essay, Bezos said presidential endorsements do “nothing to tip the scales of an election.” Instead they “create a perception of bias.”
That has allowed the space to be filled by social media posts and other unverified news sources. He urged readers to realize that changes like the endorsement decision are necessary, and that he will not push his personal interests through the Post.
“I will also not allow this paper to stay on autopilot and fade into irrelevance – overtaken by unresearched podcasts and social media barbs – not without a fight,” Bezos wrote.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Hindkesharistaff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
