Jonathan Capehart (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Gay Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jonathan Capehart has taken a buyout offer to leave the Washington Post after nearly 20 years.
He will continue his work as a political analyst for PBS and as a co-host of MSNBC’s “The Weekend” show.
News of his departure, reported by Axios on July 21, comes after the recent exodus of several colleagues: Ann Telnaes, David Shipley, Ruth Marcus, Eugene Robinson, and Joe Davidson.
In the second Trump administration, the storied D.C. newspaper has been seen as moving to the right under the leadership of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who purchased it in 2013.
For example, in February Bezos told the Post’s opinion writers to move away from politics and instead focus exclusively on issues related to “personal liberties and free markets,” prompting more than 400 staff members to sign a petition expressing “deep alarm.”
A longtime opinion columnist, Capehart resigned from the paper’s editorial board last year after a conflict over the racial overtones of an op-ed run by fellow columnist Karen Tumulty.
“The Weekend” is the first cable news program hosted by two Black gay men, Capehart and Eugene Daniels, who previously served as White House correspondent for Politico and president of the White House Correspondents’ Association.
The National LGBT Media Association represents 13 legacy publications in major markets across the country with a collective readership of more than 400K in print and more than 1 million + online. Learn more here: NationalLGBTMediaAssociation.com.
