WASHINGTON — In a significant shake-up, The Washington Post made the difficult decision on Wednesday to lay off around one-third of its workforce. This sweeping reduction has led to the closure of its sports section, several international bureaus, and its books coverage, marking a profound impact on the storied institution and the field of journalism as a whole.

The Post’s Executive Editor, Matt Murray, described the layoffs as a painful yet essential step to secure the publication’s future amid evolving technological landscapes and shifting reader behaviors. “We can’t be everything to everyone,” Murray stated in a message to employees.

During a company-wide virtual meeting, Murray detailed the changes, after which employees received emails with subject lines indicating whether their positions were retained or terminated.

Speculation regarding potential layoffs had been circulating for weeks, particularly after it emerged that sports journalists were not being sent to cover the Winter Olympics in Italy. However, the breadth and depth of the staff reductions took many by surprise, impacting nearly every part of the newsroom.

Margaret Sullivan, a journalism professor at Columbia University and former media critic for both The Washington Post and The New York Times, expressed her dismay at the news. “It’s devastating for anyone who values journalism in America and around the world,” Sullivan remarked. “The Washington Post has played a crucial role in news, sports, and cultural reporting.”

Martin Baron, the first editor of The Post under the ownership of billionaire Jeff Bezos, criticized the cuts and accused his former employer of causing what he termed “near-instant, self-inflicted brand destruction.”

As of midday, the Post did not have any news of the changes on its website.

Journalists pleaded with Bezos for help

Bezos, who has been silent in recent weeks amid pleas from Post journalists to step in and prevent the cutbacks, had no immediate comment Wednesday.

The newspaper has been bleeding subscribers in part due to decisions made by Bezos, including pulling back from an endorsement of Kamala Harris, a Democrat, during the 2024 presidential election against Donald Trump, a Republican, and directing a more conservative turn on liberal opinion pages.

A private company, the Post does not reveal how many subscribers it has, but it is believed to be roughly 2 million. The Post would also not say how many people it has on staff, making it impossible to precisely estimate how many people were laid off Wednesday. The Post also did not outline its finances.

The Post’s troubles stand in contrast to its longtime competitor The New York Times, which has been thriving in recent years, in large part due to investments in ancillary products such as games and its Wirecutter product recommendations. The Times has doubled its staff over the past decade.

Eliminating the sports section puts an end to a department that has hosted many well-known bylines through the years, among them John Feinstein, Michael Wilbon, Shirley Povich, Sally Jenkins and Tony Kornheiser. The Times has also largely ended its sports section, but it has replaced the coverage by buying The Athletic and incorporating its work into the Times website.

The Post’s Book World, a destination for book reviews, literary news and author interviews, has been a dedicated section in its Sunday paper.

A half-century ago, the Post’s coverage of Watergate, led by intrepid reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, entered the history books. The Style section under longtime editor Ben Bradlee hosted some of the country’s best feature writing.

All Mideast correspondents and editors laid off

Word of specific cuts drifted out during the day, as when Cairo Bureau Chief Claire Parker announced on X that she had been laid off, along with all of the newspaper’s Middle East correspondents and editors. “Hard to understand the logic,” she wrote.

In the immediate future, Murray said, the Post would concentrate on areas that demonstrate authority, distinctiveness and impact, and resonate with readers, including politics, national affairs and security. Even during its recent troubles, The Post has been notably aggressive in coverage of Trump’s changes to the federal workforce.

The company’s structure is rooted in a different era, when the Post was a dominant print product, Murray said in his note to staff members. In areas such as video, the outlet hasn’t kept up with consumer habits, he said.

“Significantly, our daily story output has substantially fallen in the last five years,” he said. “And even as we produce much excellent work, we too often write from one perspective, for one slice of the audience.”

While there are business areas that need to be addressed, Baron pointed a finger of blame at Bezos – for a “gutless” order to kill a presidential endorsement and for remaking an editorial page that stands out only for “moral infirmity” and “sickening” efforts to curry favor with Trump.

“Loyal readers, livid as they saw owner Jeff Bezos betraying the values he was supposed to uphold, fled The Post,” Baron wrote. “In truth, they were driven away, by the hundreds of thousands.”

Baron said he was grateful for Bezos’ support when he was editor, noting that the Amazon founder came under brutal pressure from Trump during the president’s first term.

“He spoke forcefully and eloquently of a free press and The Post’s mission, demonstrating his commitment in concrete terms,” Baron wrote. “He often declared that The Post’s success would be among the proudest achievements of his life. I wish I detected the same spirit today. There is no sign of it.”