The Washington Post is reducing its workforce by roughly one-third, affecting both the newsroom and other departments, the Associated Press reported on Wednesday.
The outlet started to roll out major staff reductions on Wednesday, cutting its sports department and scaling back the number of reporters assigned to foreign countries, according to the AP. Executive editor Matt Murray revealed the moves during a Zoom meeting with employees.
“The Washington Post is taking a number of difficult but decisive actions today for our future, in what amounts to a significant restructuring across the company,” a Post spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “These steps are designed to strengthen our footing and sharpen our focus on delivering the distinctive journalism that sets The Post apart and, most importantly, engages our customers.”
A representative for the Post confirmed to the AP that one-third of the workforce would be laid off, but did not disclose the outlet’s total number of employees.
Moreover, Murray informed employees that the Post’s book department would be shuttered, while its Washington-area news department and editing personnel would undergo restructuring, according to the AP. The outlet will also suspend its daily “Post Reports” podcast.
The Post’s Cairo bureau chief Claire Parker asserted on X Wednesday that she was laid off, “along with the entire roster of Middle East correspondents and our editors.”
“This is a tragic day for American journalism, the city of Washington, and the country as a whole,” the Post’s chief economics correspondent Jeff Stein told Semafor. “I’m grieving for reporters I love and whose work upheld the truest and most noble callings of the profession. They are being punished for mistakes they did not cause.”
Owner Jeff Bezos ordered the layoffs, which will significantly affect every newsroom department, NPR reported on Wednesday.
“These layoffs are not inevitable,” the Washington Post Guild posted on X Wednesday. “A newsroom cannot be hollowed out without consequences of its credibility, its reach and its future.”
“In just the last three years, the Post’s workforce has shrunk by roughly 400 people,” it added. “Continuing to eliminate workers only stands to weaken the newspaper, drive away readers and undercut The Post’s mission: to hold power to account without fear or factor and provide critical information for communities across the region, country and world.”
The Post’s web traffic also plunged by nearly 90% from January 2021 to the middle of 2025 from around 22.5 million daily active users to just 2.5-3 million, according to Semafor.
An overhaul at the Post commenced in June 2024, when then-executive editor Sally Buzbee abruptly resigned. Since then, the outlet has faced internal strife and multiple rounds of layoffs.
The outlet reportedly laid off more than a dozen editorial staffers in its Opinion section in October.
The Post opted not to endorse a 2024 presidential candidate in the month before the election, and Bezos announced in February 2025 that the newspaper’s opinion section would focus on defending personal liberties and free markets.
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