Jeff Bezos, the multi-billionaire owner of the Washington Post, faced continued criticism over the weekend as executives from his aerospace company met with Donald Trump on the same day. Election.
The Washington Post’s senior news and opinion leaders flew to Miami in late September 2024 to meet with Bezos, who had reservations about the New York Times endorsement of the November 5 election. reported.
Amazon and aerospace company Blue Origin are among the Bezos-owned businesses that are still vying for lucrative federal government contracts.
The Post announced on Friday that it would not endorse a candidate for the Nov. 5 election after its editorial board had already drawn its endorsement of Kamala Harris.
Friday’s announcement did not mention Amazon or Blue Origin. But within hours, top officials from the latter company met briefly with Trump after a campaign speech in Austin, Texas, as the Republican nominee seeks a second term as president.
Trump met with Blue Origin CEO David Limb and Megan Mitchell, vice president of government relations, the Associated Press reported.
Meanwhile, CNN reported Amazon CEO Andy Jassy also recently reached out to the former president on the phone.
Those statements were removed by Washington Post editor and longtime columnist Robert Kagan, who resigned on Friday. On Saturday, he argued that Blue Origin executives’ meeting with Trump would not have happened if Post had endorsed the Democratic vice president as planned.
“Trump waited for confirmation that Bezos did what he said he was going to do — then met with blue-eyed people,” Kagan said. said Saturday’s Daily Beast. “This tells us that a real deal was made, meaning that Bezos communicated directly with Trump, or through his people, and they set up this quid pro quo.”
Will Lewis, publisher of The Post, was hired by Bezos in January. protected The owner of the paper said that Harris had decided to increase the endorsement. But that did little to assuage criticism from the newspaper’s ranks and the wave of cancellations that hit the company.
Eighteen opinion columnists in the Washington Post signed a dissenting column against the decision. call It was “a terrible mistake”. The magazine has already endorsed it, including in this election cycle A race for a US Senate seat in Maryland. The Washington Post approved Hillary Clinton endorsed Trump in 2016 when he won the presidency Joe Biden When Trump lost in 2020, despite Trump’s promise to retaliate against anyone who opposed him.
In their criticism of the Post’s decision on Friday, former and current staffers cited dangers to democracy posed by Trump, who has openly expressed his admiration for authoritarian rule as voters implore him to return to office.
Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, former Washington Post journalists who broke the Watergate story; was invited The result was “disappointing, especially this late in the electoral process”.
Former Washington Post managing editor Marty Barron a Position In X, “It is cowardice, the death of democracy”.
The cartoon team at the paper ran a dark, shapeless image protesting the no-approval decision, playing on the “democracy dies in darkness” slogan adopted by the Post in 2017, five years after it was bought by Bezos.
High-profile readers, including best-selling author Stephen King and former congresswoman and vocal Trump critic Liz Cheney, declared Their Washington Post subscriptions were canceled in protest.
The Post’s lack of endorsement came shortly after Patrick Soon-Shiong, the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, refused to allow the editorial board to publish Harris’ endorsement.
Many pointed out how the positions of the Post and LA Times fit the definition of “expected obedience” set forth in Tim Snyder’s best-selling guide to tyranny, On Tyranny. Snyder defines the term as “surrendering your power to the tyranny of desire.”
It’s pesos The second richest man Behind Elon Musk, he has become a key supporter of Trump’s campaign for a second term in the world. In 2013, he bought the Washington Post for $250 million.
In 2021, Bezos stepped down as CEO of Amazon. to say During a podcast interview, he wanted to devote more time to Blue Origin.
The New York Times reported Bezos became more involved in the paper in 2023 as it faced significant financial losses, employee departures and low morale.
In January he selected Lewis as publisher. According to the New York Times, as a journalist in London, the paper’s staff and patrons were concerned that Lewis had been brought to the Post despite allegations that he had “fraudulently obtained telephone and company records in newspaper articles.” reported.
However, A Note To newsroom leaders in June 2024, Bezos wrote, “Journalistic standards and ethics at the Post will not change.”