The information industry is in the midst of upheaval. A presidential election is imminent. Facing financial woes and political divisions, several of America’s biggest news organizations have handed the reins to editors who reward relentless reporting on the budget.
And they are all British.
Will Lewis, a veteran of London’s Daily Telegraph and News UK, is now chief executive of the Washington Post, where journalists have raised questions about his Fleet Street ethics. He recently fired the newspaper’s American editor-in-chief and replaced her with a former colleague from the Telegraph, stunning American journalists who had never heard of him.
Emma Tucker (formerly of the Sunday Times) took over the Wall Street Journal last year, shortly after Mark Thompson (formerly of the BBC) became president of CNN, where he directed an American remake from the long-running BBC comedy quiz ‘Have I Got News for You’.
They joined a large number of Britons already recognized in the American media establishment. Michael Bloomberg, a noted Anglophile, hired John Micklethwait (former editor of the London-based Economist newspaper) in 2015 to run Bloomberg News. Rupert Murdoch called on Keith Poole (The Sun and The Daily Mail) to edit the New York Post in 2021, the same year that the Associated Press appointed an Englishwoman, Daisy Veerasingham, as its chief executive.
“We are the ultimate trophies for American billionaires,” joked Joanna Coles, the English-born editor who in April became head of the Daily Beast, the online news outlet itself named after a newspaper in a novel by Evelyn Waugh. Ms Coles did not hesitate to recruit more of her compatriots, appointing a Scot as editor and a Guardian journalist as Washington bureau chief.
“We’re stocked up on Brits,” she said in an interview.
Theories abound about the enduring appeal of British publishers to American owners. The accent has its own worldly allure. But uncompromising, scrappy journalism is a much-loved tradition in Britain, where major newspapers and tabloids have battled it out for decades, often with budgets dwarfed by those of their American rivals.
British journalists tend to be paid less than their American counterparts, an advantage for many news organizations already facing budget cuts. And while Fleet Street has a reputation for vague ethics, that goes hand in hand with a reader-pleasing willingness to burn sacred cows.
“I think the British press is a lot less arrogant and what I call the elite press in the United States is a lot more self-righteous about its place in the world,” said Tina Brown, former editor of Vanity Fair, The New Yorker. and The Daily Beast, said in an interview.
She said the erosion of the U.S. news industry also meant owners had fewer choices among local leaders.
“If you’re looking for a new person to run the Washington Post, what’s proportionate in terms of the institution right now? » said Ms. Brown. “What’s left? So many newspapers have disappeared that we’re left with a much smaller pool of people trained to fill this particular role.”
Ms. Brown launched the transatlantic convoy in 1984 when Condé Nast hired her to edit Vanity Fair. His very English blend of sass, acerbic prose and class obsession made the then-struggling magazine a success. She was soon joined at Condé Nast by Anna Wintour, whose father was the long-time editor of the Evening Standard in London.
“Americans think we are cheaper and fiercer,” Ms. Wintour, editor-in-chief of Vogue since 1988 and chief content officer of Condé Nast, wrote in an email. “It’s also true that news is so much a part of British culture that it’s in our blood – a bit like football, comedy or Shakespeare.
“British journalists also tend to be hardened. News is a tough business in the UK – and has been for centuries – and so when US media companies feel they have to fight to stay relevant or profitable, it is perhaps natural that they turn towards the other side of the Atlantic.
Ms Coles agreed with this assessment. “The British tend to be good with fewer resources,” she said. “The industry is in crisis and the British are unfazed in a crisis.”
Moreover, Ms. Coles added, the current malaise in American politics and the fear of a decline in the country’s global power seem outdated in British eyes.
“The end of the empire is a very familiar scenario for us, so it doesn’t intimidate us,” she said.
British publishers also have a strong track record.
Ms. Wintour and Ms. Brown were so successful that for a time British journalists ran Details, National Review, The New Republic, Self, Condé Nast Traveler and Harper’s Bazaar. CNN’s Mr. Thompson, who became a U.S. citizen this year, is credited with reviving the fortunes of The New York Times during his eight-year tenure as chief executive.
There were occasional hiccups. In 1992, Ms. Brown lured Alexander Chancellor, the former editor of the Old Etonian The Spectator, to the New Yorker and put him in charge of its “Talk of the Town” section, famous for its sophisticated view of life in Manhattan. Shortly after his arrival, Mr. Chancellor, who died in 2017told his colleagues that he had stumbled upon an astonishing story: a gigantic Christmas tree outside Rockefeller Center.
The article was quietly killed. And Mr Chancellor was unemployed a few months later.
This recent crop of British imports can be explained by the new shortage in the American information sector. Ms. Tucker and Mr. Thompson oversaw layoffs and budget cuts; Mr. Lewis warned his team that The Post lost $77 million last year and its readership has halved since 2020.
But while British journalists are used to intense competition, their journalistic rules do not always conform to American standards. At the Washington Post, home of Woodward and Bernstein, some of Mr. Lewis’ behavior disrupted the newsroom.
The New York Times reported Wednesday that Mr. Lewis had urged former Post editor Sally Buzbee not to cover up a court ruling over her involvement in Rupert Murdoch’s phone-hacking scandal in Britain. (A representative for Mr. Lewis said the account of the conversation was inaccurate.) An NPR reporter then revealed that Mr. Lewis had offered an exclusive interview if the journalist agreed to publish an article on the scandal. (The representative said that Mr. Lewis spoke with NPR before joining The Post, and that after joining The Post, interview requests were made “through normal company communications channels.”)
This type of behavior may be acceptable in some London newspapers, where owners are less reluctant to play games with media coverage. In American newsrooms, it is verboten – just like the practice of paying for news. At the Telegraph, Mr. Lewis is said to have spent 110,000 pounds for documents that fueled a damaging expose on parliamentary corruption. (Its rivals at the Sun and the Times of London have balked at a similar deal.) The Telegraph reporter who obtained the documents, Robert Winnett, is expected to become editor of the Post later this year.
As for the view of the pond?
“We all welcome this with a mixture of amusement and outrage,” said one Fleet Street editor, who requested anonymity to avoid the wrath of his overly sensitive superiors. (In keeping with the spirit of the British tabloids, the request was granted.)
“It is amusing that these high priests of American journalism are monstrous by good old-fashioned, tough-as-nails British editors; indignation that they find it so extraordinary that they might have something to learn on the other side of the Atlantic,” the editor said. “Yes, our standards are a little lower, but we are extremely competitive, intense and absurd, and that is probably helpful given how the industry is changing.”
Benjamin Mullin And Katie Robertson reports contributed.
