Ex-Washington Submit truth checker calls Jeff Bezos 'absentee proprietor'

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The Washington Submit is a sinking ship with a captain lacking in motion. And based on its now-former fact-checker, that lacking captain is its billionaire proprietor, Jeff Bezos .

"He must be dedicated to it. If he is not dedicated to it, he ought to discover another person to personal it," Glenn Kessler advised Fox News Digital . "I really feel like he was type of dedicated to it. After which he is type of an absentee proprietor, and he should not be as a result of it is, you understand, one of many prime belongings of American journalism."

Kessler left the Submit in July after greater than 27 years on the paper — and his closing years there weren't the perfect.

"What's so saddening is that 5 years in the past, I might not have imagined The Washington Submit could be on this state," Kessler mentioned.

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Former Washington Submit fact-checker Glenn Kessler says billionaire Jeff Bezos "must be dedicated" to saving the paper he owns or "discover another person to personal it." (Getty photographs / Singerhmk - wiki commons)

Kessler by no means thought-about leaving the Submit till he was introduced with the buyout provide, which he accepted. The Submit has been financially bleeding, a lot in order that it reportedly was on tempo to lose at the very least $77 million in 2024. The buyouts had focused probably the most veteran staffers, aiming to chop prices and beat back layoffs in the intervening time.

The famed fact-checker was amongst a number of high-profile journalists and columnists who've left the paper in current months, lots of whom took subject with selections and editorial modifications Bezos himself had ordered.

Kessler in contrast the Submit to "being on the Titanic after it struck an iceberg — drifting aimlessly because it sank, with not sufficient lifeboats for everybody" in a piece he wrote on his newly-launched Substack account.

"They should have a imaginative and prescient of the place they wish to go. And I've not seen that imaginative and prescient but. Or if there's a imaginative and prescient, it isn't been clearly articulated," Kessler mentioned. "It is gonna be a extremely rocky interval within the information enterprise within the subsequent 5 to 10 years. And the Submit must be ready for that. And I type of really feel like they've misplaced a variety of, you understand, essential sailors and captains to maintain the ship going. In order that they're gonna should make do with much less."

Earlier than hitting the iceberg Bezos has been the goal of intense blowback by liberals, who've accused him of bending the knee to President Donald Trump primarily based on actions which have rocked the paper.

First was his determination in October to halt the deliberate endorsement of then-Vice President Kamala Harris simply days earlier than the presidential election.

Then, in February, he launched a brand new mission for the editorial pages to advertise "private liberties and free markets," vowing to not publish any items that go towards these ideas.

Each situations sparked insurrection among the many paper's liberal readers, resulting in the cancellation of a whole bunch of 1000's of subscriptions. A number of staffers additionally resigned in protest.

However Kessler wasn't at all times a Bezos critic. He credited the Amazon founder for saving the Submit when he purchased it in 2013.

"Earlier than Bezos purchased the newspaper, it was in actually unhealthy form," he advised Fox Information Digital. "Folks overlook how, you understand, as a result of the Graham household did not actually have the sources to maintain it going within the new period. And there had been a bunch of buyouts and other people have been requested to go away. So it had been a reasonably grim interval then."

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Kessler referred to as Jeff Bezos an "absentee proprietor" of The Washington Submit. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Photos)

Issues on the Submit have been souring a lot in order that Kessler himself had been interviewing for a unique job exterior the paper. That was till he was provided The Reality Checker stint in 2011, which he accepted, pondering that if the ship went down, he himself may keep afloat together with his personal "model."

"However then Bezos purchased the paper, and he invested some huge cash within the paper," Kessler mentioned. "So the dimensions of the employees doubled. The variety of international bureaus most likely went up [by] at the very least a 3rd. The sources dedicated to engineering help surged, so the net pages began loading sooner, and we may do improbable graphics. There was funding in video… And you actually felt just like the Submit was going locations, and it was truly producing higher journalism at any level within the time I had labored on the Submit."

"And now it's simply… it is prefer it hit an iceberg, and it is type of drifting there, and I do not assume there is a plan to rescue it. Or at the very least a plan to, you understand, flip the ship round and get it shifting within the route it was."

‘The Avis Downside’ Kessler blamed administration for being "somewhat dazzled" by the visitors spike that got here through the first Trump administration, reaching ranges "nearly equal" to the Submit's prime rival, The New York Times . However then, not like the Occasions, the Submit did not capitalize on its new readers by not increasing its portfolio.

"I've sat in lots of conferences and had many discussions and heard numerous speeches. I nonetheless do not know what they're attempting to do," Kessler mentioned of his former bosses. "It vaguely appears to say we're gonna attraction [to] the individuals… who do not actually care concerning the information. And we're gonna present merchandise that might enable them to learn The Washington Submit and discover out data they should know," he mentioned.

"And the issue, as I wrote in my piece, is that that is what The New York Occasions has been doing for ten years. They've 10 million subscribers, however a big chunk of which are individuals that do not get the core information product," Kessler continued. "They get the recipes, they get The Athletic — the sports activities part, they get product suggestions, they get the video games, they play Wordle."

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He mentioned the Submit is caught with "the Avis downside," citing the automobile rental firm's outdated adverts that claimed "We attempt more durable," alluding to the truth it was at all times within the shadow of Hertz, a dynamic much like the Grey Girl.

"The Washington Submit has at all times been No. 2. It is by no means had the identical measurement circulation because the Occasions. I might argue information protection was higher, however perhaps I used to be biased about that," Kessler conceded to Fox Information Digital.

"However now on this fragmented market, individuals have to select. What Substacks am I going to subscribe to? What newsletters am I gonna get? What networks am I going to look at? ‘Oh, I would like one newspaper. I will be keen to spend cash on one newspaper,' and the default is at all times going to be, sadly, The New York Occasions."

He continued, "It is a broader product. It has higher arts protection, theater protection. I've by no means gotten an understanding of how the Submit was going to fight that downside. And it appeared like the answer was, 'Oh, we'll be like a mini-me New York Occasions with issues to attraction to individuals that do not comply with information.' Properly, they already get that in The New York Occasions."

The Submit has scrapped an initiative launched final yr dubbed "WP Ventures," meant to draw social media customers. Nevertheless, the paper seems to already be pivoting with Tuesday's announcement of former Axios government editor and former Submit reporter, Sara Kehaulani Goo, returning as its president of Creator Community — a brand new place Goo says might be "creating personality-driven content material" and assist present advertisers "entry" to a brand new viewers pushed by creators.

The Washington Submit had simply carried out a spherical of buyouts concentrating on probably the most veteran of staffers. (Kevin Carter/Getty Photos)

The ‘meteorite’ wiping off the remaining dinosaurs The Occasions and the rise of latest media weren't the one obstacles going through the Submit.

"Halfway by my journalism profession, I began saying, 'I am working for a dinosaur.' And AI is sort of presumably the meteorite that may kill off the final of the dinosaurs," Kessler mentioned to Fox Information Digital. "I am significantly involved about what AI is gonna do, as a result of AI is gonna kill search. And search was how individuals usually discovered our information articles."

"The statistics I had seen was that 4 or 5 years in the past, each 100 searches on Google yielded six clicks on a information website. Now it is about each 100 searches yields two clicks on the information website. When individuals use AI, a thousand searches lead to one click on," he continued. "So it is a dramatic distinction. And if I have been operating a information group, at this level, I do not know fairly what I might do about that. So it is a unhealthy time to be operating a brand new group. I do have sympathy for the scenario that [Washington Post publisher and CEO] Will Lewis and [Washington Post executive editor] Matt Murray discover themselves in proper now. I simply query whether or not or not they actually have discovered what to do."

Goo mentioned in her announcement that "we'll be infusing AI with all the things that we do to assist us maximize effectivity and scale."

However the buck in the end stops with Bezos, based on Kessler.

"The Submit was actually at its excessive level [after Bezos' purchase]— the quantity of tales we're producing, the standard of the tales was actually important. After which, visitors surged when Trump bought elected and there was a lot starvation and curiosity within the information we have been producing. We type of misplaced our means after that," Kessler mentioned. "And never solely misplaced our means, we began dropping oodles of cash. 100 million {dollars} one yr, I believe the final quantity I noticed [in] 2023 was $77 million … I believe even for an individual as wealthy as Jeff Bezos, that counts as actual cash."

"And I've gotten the sense that he is a little bit of an absentee proprietor. He is had different distractions, and he is dedicated extra to a few of his different enterprises, resembling an area firm, than he's to The Washington Submit, which is basically only a tiny a part of his enterprise investments. And perhaps, I do not know, I hate to invest, perhaps you thought he gave us his finest shot, and we blew it, and now we have it muddled by," he added.

A spokesperson for The Washington Submit advised Fox Information Digital, " The Washington Submit is reinventing itself to be a trusted information supply for all Individuals. Meaning working arduous every day to publish probably the most correct information, alongside opinions that resonate throughout the nation."

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Fox Information' Annie McCuen contributed to this report.

Joseph A. Wulfsohn is a media reporter for Fox Information Digital. Story suggestions will be despatched to joseph.wulfsohn@fox.com and on Twitter: @JosephWulfsohn.