A Los Angeles Times editor resigned in protest in the wake of the newspaper owner's decision to block the editorial board from making an endorsement in the presidential race.
The Times editorial board was set to endorse Democrat nominee Kamala Harris for president until Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, who bought the newspaper in 2018, informed Times editor Terry Tang on Oct. 11 that the paper would not take a position.
Editorials editor Mariel Garza quit Wednesday, telling Columbia Journalism Review that "in dangerous times, honest people need to stand up. This is how I'm standing up."
What put Garza over the edge was the Times stayed silent when news of Soon-Shiong's decision was reported Tuesday.
"The reality hit me like cold water Tuesday when the news rippled out about the decision not to endorse without so much as a comment from the LAT management," Garza wrote to Tang in her resignation letter, also published by CJR.
"Of course it matters that the largest newspaper in the state — and one of the largest in the nation still — declined to endorse in a race this important. And it matters that we won't even be straight with people about it," Garza added in her resignation letter.
Soon-Shiong took to social media on Wednesday to "clarify how this decision came about."
"The Editorial Board was provided the opportunity to draft a factual analysis of all the POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE policies by EACH candidate during their tenures at the White House, and how these policies affected the nation," he wrote in a post to X.
"In this way, with this clear and non-partisan information side-by-side, our readers could decide who would be worthy of being president for the next four years. Instead of adopting this path as suggested, the Editorial Board chose to remain silent, and I accepted their decision," he wrote.
The campaign for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump pounced.
"In Kamala's own home state, the Los Angeles Times — the state's largest newspaper — has declined to endorse the Harris-Walz ticket, despite endorsing the Democrat nominees in every election for decades," the campaign said.
Soon-Shiong also prevented the Times from endorsing Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., in the 2020 Democrat primary, according to CJR. The paper did endorse Joe Biden for president over Trump, however.
"I didn't think we were going to change our readers' minds — our readers, for the most part, are Harris supporters," Garza told CJR regarding her resignation decision. "We're a very liberal paper. I didn't think we were going to change the outcome of the election in California."
"It was a logical next step," Garza went on. "And it's perplexing to readers, and possibly suspicious, that we didn't endorse her this time."
Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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