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Bezos says Washington Post opinion pages will focus on ‘personal liberties and free markets’

Amazon executive and newspaper owner says in letter that ‘viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others’

The billionaire owner of The Washington Post has moved to reshape the paper’s opinion section. Photograph: John Locher/AP

The billionaire owner of The Washington Post has moved to reshape the paper’s opinion section. Photograph: John Locher/AP

Jeff Bezos, the self-proclaimed “hands-off” owner of the Washington Post, emailed staffers this morning about a change he’s applying to the paper’s opinion section.

“I’m writing to let you know about a change coming to our opinion pages. We are going to be writing every day in support and defense of two pillars: personal liberties and free markets,” Bezos said.

“We’ll cover other topics too of course, but viewpoints opposing those pillars will be left to be published by others. There was a time when a newspaper, especially one that was a local monopoly, might have seen it as a service to bring to the reader’s doorstep every morning a broad-based opinion section that sought to cover all views. Today, the internet does that job.”

Bezos emphasized that he’s “for America, and proud to be so” and that he offered “David Shipley, whom I greatly admire, the opportunity to lead this new chapter”.

“I suggested to him that if the answer wasn’t ‘hell yes,’ then it had to be ‘no.’ After careful consideration, David decided to step away. This is a significant shift, it won’t be easy, and it will require 100% commitment – I respect his decision,” he wrote, adding that the paper is now “searching for a new opinion editor to own this new direction”.

Bezos also shared the letter to staff directly on his X page.

More details soon…

Author: Editors Desk, Guardian staff

Source: The Guardian

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