Months after William Lewis took charge as the chief executive of the Washington Post, controversies have spiralled at the American publication with its executive editor Sally Buzbee reportedly exiting the newsroom after Lewis’s attempts to kill stories about his alleged involvement in a UK phone hacking scandal.
That’s not all. The veteran media chief also allegedly offered an exclusive interview to an NPR reporter in December last year in exchange for not publishing a report on the scandal.
The decade-old controversy involving Lewis and right-wing media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World tabloid was revived by a lawsuit filed by several public figures including Prince Harry. It alleged that the tabloid indulged in illegal privacy invasions, including phone hacking from the mid-1990s until 2016. While the case is going on, Lewis has denied the charges.
Lewis, who is now the Washington Post chief, allegedly pressured multiple journalists, including editors at his organisation, to not carry stories related to the court proceedings of the case.
Quoting employees, the Washington Post reported today that Lewis told former executive editor Buzbee in May that a story about the judge’s decision on whether to include Murdoch’s executives, including Lewis, in the case as individuals accused of covering up evidence, “did not warrant coverage and that publishing it represented a lapse in judgement”.
Weeks after the detailed story was published, Lewis announced Buzbee’s departure and a major shift in the newsroom’s leadership. In March too, reportedly, Lewis had a similar exchange with Buzbee, when the Washington Post published a brief report on the case proceedings. This has come amid growing financial troubles for the publication.
To add to the controversy, NPR’s veteran reporter David Folkenflik alleged on Thursday that Lewis “repeatedly, and heatedly” offered to give him an “exclusive interview” about the Washington Post’s future ahead of joining the news outlet in December in exchange for dropping a story about the allegations against him.
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