Washington withdrawal
For local or regional news organizations, having a Washington bureau isn’t a vanity play. It allows reporters to monitor what their congressional delegations are doing, how much influence they have on Capitol Hill and who’s twisting their arms (or trying to). There is no substitute for roaming the halls and catching lawmakers in a scrum to ask questions.
That’s why the news that McClatchy is closing its Washington bureau, first reported on X by Guardian media reporter Jeremy Barr, generated a sense of loss. On top of that, the company is also eliminating its real-time news operation, Oliver Darcy of Status reported. And opinion journalists were also laid off, including in Fresno, Calif., according to The San Joaquin Valley Sun, and Columbia, S.C., writes Matthew T. Hall on LinkedIn.
As for Washington, the closure of McClatchy’s bureau reinforced the notion that journalism in the nation’s capital isn’t what it used to be. As Dan Kennedy of Media Nation writes, the McClatchy bureau (then known as Knight-Ridder) “did more than any news organization to expose lies and falsehoods in the run-up to the disastrous war in Iraq.”
Almost two years ago, Cameron Joseph wrote a piece for CJR provocatively titled “The Death of the Washington Bureau.” Back then, he noted that most states didn’t have “a single reporter covering Washington on the ground anymore.”
The casualty list, it appears, has only continued to grow.
News In Focus
Headlines, resources and events aligned with API’s four areas of focus.
Civic Discourse & Democracy
>> Hell Gate took on the New York City mayoral election with a livestream and watch parties (Nieman Lab)
Neel Dhanesha describes Hell Gate’s “watch party” live-stream strategy on the night of New York City’s mayoral election. “It quickly became apparent that Hell Gate had figured out how to translate its signature voice — irreverent yet deeply knowledgeable — into video,” he writes.
- Plus: CNN’s All Access election night ‘watch party’ might not be the network’s future (The Guardian)
>> IDJC launches Local NExT Lab to test ideas for strengthening local news (Syracuse University Newhouse School of Public Communications)
The new lab at Syracuse’s Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship will be led by associate professor Joshua Darr and will connect local newsrooms eager to experiment with funders and researchers interested in interpreting field tests.
—
Culture & Inclusion
>> “Biased,” “boring” and “bad”: Unpacking perceptions of news media and journalism among U.S. teens (News Literacy Project)
In a followup survey to one conducted last year on teen attitudes toward media, NLP found that the majority of teens view news media negatively. The findings, the group said, “paint a shockingly bleak picture of how teens view and understand journalism and news media today.”
—
Community Engagement & Trust
>> How Tiktok inspired the New York Times vertical video strategy (Press Gazette)
The Times’ videos are a mix of narrated news footage, “first-person takes” from the news staff and lifestyle and cooking content, writes Dominic Ponsford, who spoke with two people driving the news organization’s video strategy.
—
Revenue & Resilience
>> Northwest publishers avoiding consolidation or closure, maintaining independence (Medill Local News Initiative)
Brier Dudley writes about how local newspapers in the Northwest are managing to survive and remain independent by “selling to employees, diversifying print operations and cultivating the next generation of operators.”
>> AI helps newsroom, ad targeting at Boston Globe, Philadelphia Inquirer (INMA)
Sonali Verma looks at case studies she sees as “solid examples of AI use by news brands.” The Inquirer’s journalists are using AI to save time as they search for past content while the Globe is using it to better target ads and subscriptions, she writes.
—
What else you need to know
🤖 X is using AI fact-checkers (CJR)
🛠️ New collective brings direct sales support to independent journalists (Axios)
⚠️ Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads, documents show (Reuters)
👀 Condé Nast abruptly fires 4 staffers after HR confrontation (Semafor)
—
Weekend reads
+ War photographer Lynsey Addario on the risks of war journalism: “There are people who don’t want the truth to come out” (Vanity Fair)
+ When the food journalist needs food stamps (Bon Appétit)
+ ‘You have to jump’: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is betting its future on digital (Adweek)
+ It’s cool to have no followers now (The New Yorker)
