Washington Post Executive Editor Sally Buzbee is leaving her position, according to a person with knowledge of the company’s plans, a major and sudden change at one of the country’s largest news organizations.
Matt Murray, former editor-in-chief of The Wall Street Journal, will take his place, the person said.
Buzbee, 58, led the newspaper for the past three years, a turbulent period that resulted in award-winning journalism as well as a decline in audience and an exodus of some of the newsroom’s top talent.
A spokeswoman for The Post did not respond to requests for comment. Buzbee and Murray also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Will Lewis, CEO of The Washington Post, has set out to remake the paper’s front ranks since his appointment to the job last year. In April, The Post announced the addition of Suzi Watford, a former top executive at Dow Jones, the publisher of The Wall Street Journal, as its chief strategy editor. In January, The Post named Karl Wells chief growth officer, a role responsible for subscription strategy, partnerships, licensing and data analytics.
At a town hall last month, Lewis updated employees on his strategy to revive the business and revealed the extent of the Post’s financial problems, including that it lost more than $70 million in 2023 and suffered a substantial decline in its audience.
Murray, 58, ran The Journal for four years, a position to which he was appointed by Lewis, who was then CEO of Dow Jones and publisher of The Journal. Murray was replaced in 2023 by British editor Emma Tucker. Since then, he has served as a consultant to News Corp, which owns The Journal, and has worked as a contributing editor for News Items, an email newsletter publication.
Buzbee joined The Post in June 2021 after serving as executive editor of The Associated Press, where she spent her entire career. She took over The Post from Marty Baron, a legendary newspaper editor who ran The Post for eight years and oversaw its transition to ownership by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, who bought the newspaper for $250 million in 2013.
The Post greatly expanded its editing ranks under Ms. Buzbee, announcing the addition of approximately 41 positions in 2021 and revamping its vaunted Styles section. The newspaper also closed its Sunday magazine, a move that upset many of the paper’s editors. He has received six Pulitzer Prizes since joining, three of them this year.
Fred Ryan, the company’s former CEO, resigned last June and was replaced in the meantime by Patty Stonesifer, a member of Amazon’s board of directors. Stonesifer, a Bezos confidant, evaluated the company and soon determined that it needed to eliminate about 240 jobs to become economically sustainable. Stonesifer led the search for her successor and recruited Lewis to The Post last year.