Washington Post Refuses to Endorse Anyone For the First Time Since 1988

Brittany M. Hughes | October 25, 2024
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With less than two weeks to go until Election Day, the Washington Post has announced it will not be endorsing either presidential candidate this year, marking the first time since the 1980s that the “news” outlet hasn’t thrown in behind somebody.

"We are returning to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates," Will Lewis wrote in an opinion piece published on the Washington Post’s site. Lewis pointed to a pre-1976 policy the outlet had of not endorsing a candidate, a policy that was changed in 1976 when the paper endorsed Jimmy Carter following Watergate. The paper endorsed Joe Biden in 2020, and Hillary Clinton in 2016.

Lewis insisted that while some people might read into the editorial board’s latest decision as an “abdication of responsibility,” the choice not to endorse either Trump or Harris was made so Americans will be free to make up their minds on their own. Which, of course, they already are, but hey.

“We recognize that this will be read in a range of ways, including as a tacit endorsement of one candidate, or as a condemnation of another, or as an abdication of responsibility. That is inevitable. We don’t see it that way,” Lewis wrote. “We see it as consistent with the values The Post has always stood for and what we hope for in a leader: character and courage in service to the American ethic, veneration for the rule of law, and respect for human freedom in all its aspects. We also see it as a statement in support of our readers’ ability to make up their own minds on this, the most consequential of American decisions — whom to vote for as the next president.”

Related: Head of LA Times Editorial Board QUITS, Calls Paper Racist and Sexist for Not Endorsing Kamala

“Our job at The Washington Post is to provide through the newsroom nonpartisan news for all Americans, and thought-provoking, reported views from our opinion team to help our readers make up their own minds,” he went on. “Most of all, our job as the newspaper of the capital city of the most important country in the world is to be independent. And that is what we are and will be.”

NPR reports the announcement was made to WaPo staff during a “tense meeting” just before it was rolled out to the public, where employees’ reactions were reportedly “‘shocked’ and uniformly negative.”

The Post's announcement follows the LA Times' statement that they, too, will not be endorsing a candidate this year - a choice that resulted in the head of the paper's editorial board quitting in outrage and calling her now-former news outlet "sexist and racist" for not endorsing Harris.

Both the LA Times and the Washington Post's decisions against an endorsement also come very noticeably following a recent Gallup poll showing that Americans’ trust in media to report the news fairly and accurately has plummeted to historic lows, particularly among Independents and young adults. At the same time, a new survey shows that free speech is ranked the second most important issue among American voters, second only to inflation.