Post endorsement controversy sparks staff resignations, protests

A decision by The Washington Post to not endorse a candidate for president in next week's election is sparking vocal protests and resignations from some staffers.

Post publisher and CEO William Lewis announced Friday the Post would not be making an endorsement, a move that has angered staffers and stoked fears about the newspaper's editorial independence.

The Post itself reported hours later that Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon who owns the newspaper, personally made the decision not to run an endorsement after the Post's editorial board had already drafted its endorsement of Vice President Harris.

The first protest was from Post editor Robert Kagan, who told the news outlet Semafor he would step down from the publication.

On Monday, Molly Roberts, a member of the Post's editorial board, said she was also stepping down because "the imperative to endorse Kamala Harris over Donald Trump is about as morally clear as it gets."

"Worse, our silence is exactly what Donald Trump wants," Roberts wrote in a statement. "For the media, for us, to keep quiet."

A third staffer, David Hoffman, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist, wrote in a note to his editors obtained by The New York Times that he was stepping down from the Post's editorial board but would remain at the newspaper.

“While leaving the board, I refuse to give up on The Post, where I have spent 42 years," he wrote.

The Post has, at the same time, lost more than 200,000 digital subscribers as a result of the decision, NPR reported on Monday.

In his announcement on Friday, Lewis acknowledged the decision to not endorse a presidential candidate for the first time in more than 30 years was likely to receive blowback.

“We recognize that this will be read in a range of ways, including as a tacit endorsement of one candidate, or as a condemnation of another, or as an abdication of responsibility,” the newspaper's publisher wrote. “That is inevitable. We don’t see it that way. We see it as consistent with the values The Post has always stood for.”

Updated: 4:33 p.m.