Los Angeles Times is slated to create a new editorial board, billionaire owner Patrick Soon-Shiong announced Sunday — a directive that has been met with hostility with current editorial staffers.
Following Soon-Shiong’s Sunday announcement, an L.A. Times insider told TheWrap Monday that “the newsroom is pissed,” as it seems likely the three remaining L.A. Times Guild members on the editorial board will soon be ousted.
The billionaire newspaper owner emphasized in his tweet over the weekend the importance of “fair and balanced” journalism in light of President-elect Donald Trump’s win over Democratic nominee Kamala Harris. “When the president has won the vote of the majority of Americans, then all voices must be heard,” he wrote.
He further indicated his newspaper will monitor coverage that appears slanted left.
“Proud that we posted this letter from one of our readers on X,” he wrote after retweeting a letter to the editor from a white woman in Oxnard, who did not vote for Trump, but objected to LZ Granderson’s column, “There’s no mystery. White women handed Trump the election.”
Read the full tweet below:
The owner continued, “I will work towards making our paper and media fair and balanced so that all voices are heard and we can respectfully exchange every American’s view … from left to right to the center. Coming soon. A new Editorial Board. Trust in media is critical for a strong democracy.”
Soon-Shiong’s decision to pull the paper’s traditional presidential endorsement this year rather than back Harris already angered staffers, leading to the resignations of editorial page editor Mariel Garza, Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Greene and Karin Klein, a board member who wrote about education, environment, food and science.
The L.A. Times Guild did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s request for comment, but had previously expressed “concern” that the paper’s owner was “unfairly assigning blame to Editorial Board members for his decision not to endorse.”
Another Guild statement issued on Oct. 25 cited their ethics policy, which called into question the paper’s credibility after the canceled endorsement: “Credibility, a news organization’s most precious asset, is arduously acquired and easily squandered. It can be maintained only if each of us accepts responsibility for it,” the statement read in part, indicating that Soon-Shiong was not keeping up his end to keep the paper credible.
In the aftermath of the non-endorsement, Soon-Shiong tweeted, “The Editorial Board chose to remain silent and I accepted their decision.”
Although he has donated to Democrats in the past, including $50,000 in donations to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, Soon-Shiong was quick to congratulate Trump on his first presidential win, tweeting, “Incredible honor dining w/Pres-elect @realDonaldTrump last night. He truly wants to advance #healthcare for all.”
On Election Night 2024, his reaction to Trump’s win wasn’t as jubilant as that of Amazon and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos. “The American people have spoken and L.A. Times will take the lead to provide factual and balanced coverage as the country heals its division,” he said.
