Washington Post initiates widespread round of layoffs

The New York Times reported that The Washington Post initiated a widespread round of layoffs. The decision will affect sports, local and international news coverage.

Two sources familiar with the matter explained that the newspaper is laying off approximately 30% of its employees. This includes staff in the business area and more than 300 of the approximately 800 journalists in the newsroom.

Matt Murray, executive editor of The Washington Post, said Wednesday morning that the company had lost too much money for too long and had not met the needs of readers.

In the conversation, reviewed by The New York Times, the businessman noted that all sections would be affected in some way and that the end result would be a publication even more focused on national news and politics, as well as business and health, and much less on other areas.

"If anything, today is about positioning ourselves to become more essential to people’s lives in what is becoming more crowded, competitive and complicated media landscape. ... And after some years when, candidly, The Post has had struggles," Murray said.

In addition, it was reported that the sports section would be closed. However, part of its team of reporters would remain at the newspaper and would move to the reporting area to deal with issues related to sports culture. The Post's metro section would also be downsized, the books section would disappear and the daily news podcast, Post Reports, would be canceled.