Reporters of The Washington Post have resorted to directly addressing owner Jeff Bezos with "#SaveThePost" messages on social media amid reports of significant layoffs on the horizon.
Those reporters are calling on Bezos after Dylan Byers of the digital news publication Puck reported over the weekend that “hundreds” of WaPo employees are going to be fired soon. Byers reported the sports department is going to be shuttered and that the foreign desk is going to be “hit hard too.”
Reporters have been kept in the dark as rumours swirled over the weekend after a series of reports caused panic at the paper, prompting the paper’s foreign correspondents to send a letter directly to Bezos.
“We urge you to consider how the proposed layoffs will certainly lead us first to irrelevance – not the shared success that remains attainable,” the reporters wrote in the letter, reported by The New York Times.
The signatories, which included many of the paper’s most prominent international journalists, said they were open to “finding ways to reduce our costs even further” in discussion with management – “while retaining as many jobs as we can”.
“We know what happens when newspapers slash their international sections: they lose reach and they lose relevance,” the reporters wrote.
On Monday, the reporters launched a social media campaign.
"Hi @JeffBezos. We will never forget your support for our essential work documenting the war in Ukraine, which still rages. Your wife has called our team ‘badass beacons of hope.’ We risk our lives for the stories our readers demand. Please believe in us and #SaveThePost," Ukraine bureau chief Siobhán O'Grady wrote on X.
Ukraine correspondent Lizzie Johnson shared a photo of herself working and said she was doing so without power, heat or running water and, despite difficulties, is "proud to be a foreign correspondent" at the paper.
"I love my job. Every day, I put my life on the line for my job. And I would very much like to keep my job, telling stories from the front lines of a war that is reshaping the world. (I think Washington Post readers would agree int’l coverage is vital.) Please @JeffBezos," Johnson wrote.
Iran correspondent Yeganeh Torbati pleaded with Bezos to allow her coverage to continue.
"Since June, I've reported on US/Israeli strikes, a dire water crisis, state coercion of the private sector, and now, horrific govt violence against protesters. I want nothing more than to keep doing this important work. #SaveThePost," Torbati wrote.
Middle East correspondent Loveday Morris posted, "Today a source warned me that my reporting lines could have me killed. Just an average day as a foreign correspondent. I can’t count the number of times I’ve come under fire or had windows rattle from blasts. Our international staff risk so much to bring home news. #SaveThePost."
Many other Washington Post employees took to X with similar messages.
The newspaper has not confirmed that any cuts are coming.
But it would be just the latest instance of cost-cutting at the publication, which has offered rounds of buyouts to employees in 2023 and 2025, and has also done targeted layoffs of specific teams.
According to a report by The Guardian, in fall 2024, the Post laid off 54 employees from the division responsible for its proprietary publishing software. In January 2025, the Post laid off about 4 per cent of staffers – “fewer than 100 people” – as part of a strategy to “[transform] to meet the needs of the industry, build a more sustainable future and reach audiences where they are.”
Some current and former Post staffers who spoke with The Guardian conveyed a sense that Bezos, who acquired the Post in 2013 from family ownership, is missing in action.
Last year, Washington Post publisher and CEO William Lewis told staffers they should consider taking a buyout if they don't feel "aligned" with the paper's direction, which has included a revamping of the opinion section toward more championing of American values.