The Washington Post has lost at least 250,000 subscribers since announcing Friday that it would not support a presidential candidate. This represents about 10% of its digital followers, it reported Wednesday.
The Post did not officially confirm the figures, saying it was a private company, but it was reported in the newspaper citing two anonymous sources and documents familiar with the figures. Another disapproval last week led thousands of Los Angeles Times readers to cancel their subscriptions. Although it’s not at the post level.
Jon Marshall, a journalism historian at Northwestern University, observed a similar response to the 1957 boycott of the Arkansas Gazette, which supported integration of Little Rock schools, even though the paper lost more than $20 million in today’s money. He said he had trouble remembering it.
Jeff Bezos, owner of The Post, said the president’s endorsement raises awareness of bias in the paper but has little real impact on how readers vote. He said his only regret was announcing the decision when passions were heating up as election day approached. The newspaper’s editorial staff reportedly prepared an endorsement for Democrat Kamala Harris.
“Many people may have forgotten that Harris’s endorsement was scheduled to appear in the paper,” wrote Erik Wemple, the Post’s media critic. “Few people will forget the decision not to publish.”
The Post’s editor-in-chief, Matt Murray, told employees at a staff meeting that new subscriber sign-ups had been “positive for several days,” but declined to discuss numbers, the newspaper reported.
Some of the Post’s outraged digital readers have already paid for a year of access and will keep it until their subscriptions expire.
“In a month or so, the election will be over and there will be people who will come back and say, ‘They need the Post more than me,’” said Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst at the Poynter Institute.
The Post also saw a significant increase in subscriptions during Donald Trump’s presidency as people were attracted to the paper’s aggressive reporting, raising the possibility of a repeat if someone the paper is not prepared to support holds office.
Meanwhile, Edmonds said, “It’s very bad.” The Post, which lost readers during the Biden administration, is said to have shown signs of positive growth until this week.
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David Bauder writes for AP Media. follow him http://x.com/dbauder.
