What exactly led to layoffs at WaPo? Former employees point to Jeff Bezos’ ‘blank check’ era

Boyle left the Post more than a decade ago and shared some stories about mishandling in the newsroom. She said the paper’s transformation from a “for Washington, for Washington” ethos into a sprawling enterprise pursuing expensive and less relevant coverage has created larger problems that have now led to massive layoffs.

On Wednesday, February 4, The Washington Post laid off nearly a third of its newsroom staff. The newspaper has closed its newsroom. sporty desks and significantly reduced international desks.

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After Bezos purchased the newspaper from the Graham family, the motto was replaced by the now-famous slogan “Democracy dies in darkness.”

Boyle detailed that Bezos’ ownership was “the opposite” of the newsroom’s assumption that Bezos would change. She described Bezos’ ownership ultimately leading to what she calls the “blank check” era.

“He poured tons of money into a cash incinerator. He gave The Washington Post a beautiful new building,” Boyle wrote. She further added, “He subsidized every part of the newspaper, even the parts that had no readers. For more than a decade, he gave newsrooms a blank check.”

She said the costly expansion of international operations, podcasts and video content had diluted the Post’s focus. Critics argue that these investments also make journalists less adaptable to sustainable strategies as digital media consumption changes.

“Instead of adopting a reality-based strategy, the Washington Post newsroom is very accustomed to its billionaire benefactors always giving them everything they want,” Boyle wrote.

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She wrote, “The Post’s brand was and is Washington politics. It is the seat of power in America. It should focus on covering politics from its first place in Washington, D.C.”

She further said that the Post “should not be distracted by anything else” and that the Post’s strongest area has always been politics. “It lost Sport to The Athletic. It lost International to The Times,” she wrote.

She pointed to the newsroom’s lack of strategy, writing: “The old Washington Post died decades ago. Pretending that Bezos killed it is untrue.”

However, Boyle writes hopefully in her advice: “The Post can still own politics, and every story, feature and reporter should be dedicated to covering it. But it needs to stop pretending the world hasn’t changed 20 years ago and start listening to its readers again.”