Karen Heller

After thousands of stories, this is the last piece I'll ever write in the @washingtonpost. It's about Iceland, looking at the planet's future, seeing an existential threat. wapo.st/4rFJRQs

Matt Murray acknowledged in his comments during today's town hall that the Washington Post newsroom is down to over 400 people — "a well-stocked newsroom." At the end of 2022, the Post reportedly had about 1,000 journalists.

If you are a Washington Post reader eager to send a signal with your wallet right now, please donate to two fundraisers for our hundreds of dismissed, exceptional journalists (one for domestic and one for international staff): gofundme.com/f/standing-tog… and gofundme.com/f/support-for-….

So, @farhip goes deeper and discovers that the Post layoffs are deeper than understood, estimated between 44% and 47.5%.

For the record: It’s been widely reported that the @washingtonpost laid off the equivalent of a third of its newsroom last week. Terrible enough, but this appears to understate what happened.  More…

Given that the newsroom’s pre-layoff employment was 790 people, this reflects a purge of between 44 percent of the Post’s journalists at the low end and nearly HALF (47.5 percent) at the higher end.  Which is to say, the bloodbath was even bloodier than realized. End.

The Washington Post laid off its entire award-winning photo staff. Every photographer, fired. The WaPo photo staff has won 5 Pulitzers, including as recently as 2019. With a newsroom that still has 300 journalists, how do you produce a daily report with…no photographers? —>

Much of the mourning for the late great @washingtonpost has rightly focused on how democracy dies in darkness at the national level, which is hugely important. But the evisceration of Metro coverage is every bit as devastating because there is no comparable news outlet keeping local governments and institutions honest. Eight of my 20 years at the Post were spent on Metro, which was the heart and soul of the Post under the legendary @dongrahamdc1. The undertakers now running the paper have all but wiped out the metro staff, leaving just 12 reporters, according to reports, to cover a region of 6.5 million people. We had twice that many journalists in Fairfax alone back in the day. And it mattered. Reporters are the eyes and ears of the community, keeping tabs on people in power. We were there for every supervisors meeting, every school board meeting. We pored through planning commission documents and campaign filings. When county officials wasted taxpayer money, raised taxes on overstretched homeowners, gave sweetheart zoning deals to developers who filled their election coffers, we were there. When teachers who sexually abused students were quietly transferred to other schools to do it all over again, we were there. We were there for the more uplifting stories too, the cops who broke a cold case, the educators who turned around a struggling school, the residents who rallied to help neighbors in trouble, the student athletes who won the big game, the entrepreneurs who started something new. Our friend @SariHorwitz who has won more Pulitzers than I can count, wrote so movingly online about the Post (facebook.com/share/p/1AZLTT…). To recognize how indispensable local coverage is, you need only look at her holy-shit investigations of a broken child welfare system, rampant police shootings and the corporate-fed opioid crisis, stories that opened eyes and led to change. Democracy is not just what happens at the White House and the Capitol but in our own backyards. The Post has just turned the lights down at home too.

Will Lewis was too busy to join the call to tell his staff he’s destroying the @washingtonpost sports department yesterday … but he did have time to walk the red carpet at NFL Honors here in San Francisco today. Amazing.

Waking up without power, heat, or running water. (Again.) But the work here in Kyiv continues. Warming up in the car, writing in pencil — pen ink freezes — by headlamp. Despite how difficult this job can be, I am proud to be a foreign correspondent at The Washington Post.

“Unfettered” is also, unintentionally, a rather persuasive argument that Fetterman may lack the fortitude, temperament and commitment to represent Pennsylvania’s 13 million residents in the U.S. Senate. washingtonpost.com/books/2025/11/…

Another SCOOP on top of this Scoop: The whistleblower has presented evidence indicating Bove misled the Senate about his handling of the dismissal of corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams - me & @PerryStein & @theodoricmeyer shorturl.at/zPeaa

Splendid. Hitting it out of the park again and again. Thank you, Jess Walter

Paltrow, once known as an Oscar-winning actress, is our finest unrelatable relatable. Since 2008, she has promoted the aspirational absurdity that, with an abundance of time and capital, women can improve themselves to become a tad more like, well, her. washingtonpost.com/books/2025/07/…

Statement from Executive Editor Matt Murray: “For three decades, Ellen Nakashima has been one of the most careful, fair-minded, and highly regarded reporters covering national security. Reaching out to potential sources rather than relying solely on official government press statements regarding matters of public interest is neither nefarious nor is it harassment. It is basic journalism. DNI Gabbard’s unfounded personal attack reflects a fundamental misunderstanding about the role of journalists to report on government officials and hold power to account, without fear or favor and regardless of party. The Post remains committed to that vital and constitutionally protected work.”

A new biography of Claire McCardell honors the forgotten designer - The Washington Post washingtonpost.com/books/2025/06/…

It’s hard to understand the councilperson’s motivation for stopping this modestly-scaled affordable project, especially in a neighborhood that’s seeing a ton of new market-rate construction.

The Hidden Struggle of John Fetterman Extraordinary reporting courtesy of ⁦@bterris⁩ nymag.com/intelligencer/…

My first piece for @NYMag nymag.com/intelligencer/…

This is the proper way to begin a story.