‘Painful News’: Another Leftist Outlet Announces Layoffs Amid Collapse Of Mainstream Media

After President Donald Trump secured a massive Election Day victory by sharing his message largely on alternative media sources, many Americans have started to speculate that the reign of legacy news outlets is over.

That theory appears to be holding up as ratings plummet for left-leaning cable news outlets and a series of media companies have cut confirmed job cuts in recent months.

As Fox Business reported, HuffPost is among the latest to make such an announcement:

“I write with painful news,” the memo, sent by HuffPost editor-in-chief Danielle C. Belton, stated. “HuffPost is undergoing a substantial round of job eliminations due to ongoing and growing challenges to our business.”

The email, shared with New York Times media reporter Ben Mullin, revealed that HuffPost is communicating with HuffPost Union about how best to proceed.

Offers for employees may include “voluntary buyout packages to some desks in the newsroom.”

“I recognize that this is an upsetting way to start the year, and we will be sure to share more details as swiftly and clearly as possible, as I believe it is important to be transparent and share information as we have it,” Belton wrote. “In the coming days, we will make more information available about the job eliminations and HuffPost’s plans for 2025 and beyond.”

HuffPost has around 132 people in its newsroom. With the upcoming job cuts, it would lose roughly 23% of its newsroom staff.

ADVERTISEMENT

Theories about the impending collapse of mainstream media have abounded in light of the 2024 presidential race:

The mainstream media is more dead than ever after Trump’s massive electoral victory.

CNN’s viewers are down 30% and MSNBC has plummeted by 54%.

It turns out spinning lie after lie and never having any positive results to show for it just doesn’t sit well with America anymore. pic.twitter.com/BCDHAM7ObN

— Ben Swann (@BenSwann_) November 13, 2024

Yes, @LesleyRStahl legacy media is dead and you are partly to blame for it. It’s the constant lying to the American people on a daily basis. We are tired of all the bull💩. pic.twitter.com/XN2wTxC86s

— 🇺🇸𝓒𝓱𝓪𝓭🇺🇸𝓗𝓪𝓻𝓻𝓲𝓼𝓸𝓷🇺🇸 (@Texas_jeep__guy) December 15, 2024

“The legacy media will continue to fold and bend the knee to us, because it’s true – we are the media” – me in @wsj

main stream media is DEAD pic.twitter.com/2KijuBCvk3

— MORGONN (@morgonnm) December 29, 2024

Brian Stelter of CNN loses it after realizing that Mainstream Media is officially dead – confirming WE ARE THE NEWS NOW!

𝕏 is the official home of REAL NEWS!@BrianStelter finally understands he and his colleagues won’t have jobs for much longer! pic.twitter.com/y38yLpHELg

— Ole Murica (@OleMurica) December 20, 2024

The Daily Caller reported on some other recent newsroom layoffs, including the latest round of job cuts at the Washington Post:

At least one employee took to Twitter to announce they were a victim of the cuts.

“I just got laid off from Vox along with 11 other talented and delightful people,” Keren Landman, who covered public health, consumer health, and health misinformation, according to her company bio, wrote.

“I’m leaving with a deep bench of sources and a million ideas. Editors assigning work on public health, misinfo, $/religion in healthcare, please reach out! Gonna go have cookies for lunch,” she concluded.

The turnover is part of a larger trend in legacy and leftwing media. WaPo in particular has been putting out fires for months ever since executive editor Sally Buzbee stepped down in June. When the paper’s owner, Jeff Bezos, attempted to fill her role with a white man, many staffers revolted, prompting him to reveal the paper’s horrible recent performance.

ADVERTISEMENT

WaPo lost half their subscriber base between 2020 and 2023 and over $77 million since 2023, Bezos and his new CEO, Will Lewis, told staffers.

WaPo is not the only news provider to fall on hard times as of late. MSNBC, which had its ratings plummet 53% after the November election, reportedly asked some of their most prominent anchors to renegotiate their contracts to take less money, former Daily Beast editor Lachlan Cartwright reported.