Weeks before the embattled executive editor of The Washington Post abruptly resigned Sunday, her relationship with the company’s CEO became increasingly tense.
In mid-May, the two clashed over whether to publish an article about a British hacking scandal with some ties to the Post’s CEO, Will Lewis, according to two people with knowledge of their interactions.
Sally Buzbee, the editor, informed Lewis that the newsroom planned to cover a judge’s scheduled ruling in a long-running British legal case brought by Prince Harry and others against some of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids, the people said.
As part of the ruling, the judge was expected to say whether the plaintiffs could add Lewis’ name to a list of executives who they argued were involved in a plan to conceal evidence of hacking at the newspapers. Lewis told Buzbee the case involving him did not merit coverage, the people said.
When Buzbee said the Post would publish an article anyway, he said her decision represented a lapse in judgment and abruptly ended the conversation.
The interaction rattled Buzbee, who then consulted with confidants outside the Post about how she should handle the situation. When the judge ruled several days later, May 21, that Lewis could be added to the case, the Post published an article about the decision.
Lewis did not prevent the article from publishing. But the incident continued to weigh on Buzbee just as she was considering her future at the paper, according to the two people with knowledge of her decision-making process. Her eventual decision to resign has shaken one of the country’s top news organizations.
The interaction over the court ruling was not the primary reason for her resignation. Buzbee had already been mulling her future at the Post because of a plan by Lewis to reorganize the newsroom that he laid out to her in April, the people said. Lewis had offered Buzbee a job running a new division focused on social media and service journalism, according to the people. She considered that a demotion, since her job as executive editor included overseeing all parts of the news report.
A spokesperson for the Post declined to comment. Buzbee also declined to comment.
Lewis was appointed by Jeff Bezos, the Post’s owner and the founder of Amazon, late last year to remake the publication as it reeled from a steep audience decline and annual losses in the tens of millions of dollars. For the past few months, Lewis, who was previously CEO of News Corp’s Dow Jones, which publishes The Wall Street Journal, has been formulating a strategy to overhaul the business.
At a contentious staff meeting Monday, Lewis defended his business strategy, telling the newsroom that the Post had lost $77 million the previous year, had seen a 50% audience decline since 2020, and needed to make radical changes to succeed.
“Let’s not sugarcoat it. It needs turning around, right?” he said, according to a recording of the meeting. “We are losing large amounts of money. People are not reading your stuff.”
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