The most august newspaper in the US, the New York Times, was left reeling on Wednesday after its executive editor, Jill Abramson, was fired and replaced by her deputy less than three years into one of the most exalted jobs in journalism.



In a move that caught even the most senior staff at the paper unawares, Arthur Sulzberger Jr, the publisher and chairman of the New York Times Company, announced that Abramson would be replaced immediately by Dean Baquet, the paper's managing editor. He is the first African American to hold the job, although that milestone is likely to be overshadowed by the sudden dismissal of the paper's first female top editor in its 162-year history.

When she took the job in September 2011, Abramson, 60, said it was “meaningful” that a woman had been appointed to run newsroom of such an influential organisation, and her removal is now certain to be perceived as an example of the “glass cliff” facing women in high journalistic office.

In a brief statement released by the New York Times, Abramson pointedly commented that under her watch “our masthead became half female for the first time and so many great women hold important newsroom positions”.

Abramson’s exit was unexpected and almost brutally abrupt. She left without addressing the newsroom, was taken off the paper’s masthead within a few minutes of staff being informed of the change, and reports suggested she will no longer work for the newspaper.

As news dripped out about the lead up to Abramson’s firing, speculation about the reasons behind Sulzberger’s decision began to focus on her recent attempts to hire Janine Gibson, editor-in-chief of Guardian US, to act as managing editor of the Times alongside Baquet. The Times, in its own account of a day of high drama at the top of the institution, reported that the move to woo Gibson had escalated the conflict between Abramson and her deputy.

On Wednesday night Gibson, who was recently appointed editor-in-chief of the Guardian’s global website, theguardian.com, confirmed that she had been approached. She told the Guardian: “The New York Times talked to me about the role of joint managing editor, but I said no.”

The Times also on Wednesday night appeared to be heading head-first into a potentially damaging furor over unequal pay of senior women on its staff. Both Ken Auletta of the New Yorker and NPR’s media correspondent David Folkenflik reported that a few weeks ago Abramson had confronted the “top brass” after she discovered that she was paid much less than her predecessor, Bill Keller.

According to Auletta, “this may have fed into the management’s narrative that she was “pushy,” a characterization that, for many, has an inescapably gendered aspect.” As news of the apparent rift over unequal pay quickly began to spread on social media, Vox’s editor-in-chief, Ezra Klein, tweeted: “Can you imagine an editor of the New York Times not being ‘pushy’? Why on earth would you want that?”

The sense that Sulzberger now faces a potential gender backlash was heightened by a report in Capital New York that said that two senior Times journalists had spoken out at the newsroom meeting in which Abramson’s sacking was announced. They said that the dismissal would be taken negatively by many female staff members, the website said.

Abramson’s stint in the top editorial post lasted only slightly longer than that of Howell Raines, whose own departure in 2003 Abramson paradoxically hastened in the wake of the Jayson Blair plagiarism and fabrication scandal.



Sulzberger addressed the newsroom just after 2.30pm on Wednesday. According to multiple sources, he told staff that he had elevated Baquet to the top job in an effort to improve management. “I choose to appoint a new leader for our newsroom because I believe that new leadership will improve some aspects of the management of the newsroom,” he said in an account published by CNN's senior media correspondent Brian Stelter, a former media reporter at the Times .

A Politico article published in April 2013 had described Abramson as “on the verge of losing the support of the newsroom”. It reported tensions with Baquet and Mark Thompson, the former director-general of the BBC who is now CEO of the New York Times Company. It detailed a disagreement with Baquet in which she criticised his news judgment as “boring” and he replied by storming out of her office and slamming his hand against a wall.

Abramson later criticized the Politico piece as “ad feminem” attack. Citing the story’s reliance on anonymous sources, Abramson called it “shoddy.”

“This story seemed to revolve around this silly fight that Dean Baquet the managing editor of the Times and I had had one day, but like who doesn't occasionally have you know, spats with co-workers, and you know this one blew over in less than a day as most do,” Abramson said.

Reports also suggested that relations between Abramson and Thompson were strained. Thompson raised eyebrows by extending his remit into areas traditionally considered the preserve of the executive editor notably hiring a head of video production under his budget.

A New York magazine article also provoked comment when it reported that Thompson told a colleague that he could do any job at the newspaper: “I could be editor of the New York Times,” he was purported to have said.

In his statement announcing the convulsive changes, Sulzberger emphasised that the paper’s search for a digital future was a top priority. He said the new leadership had been brought in “at a time when the newsroom is about to embark on a significant effort to transition more fully to a digital-first reality”, adding that Baquet was “an enthusiastic supporter of our push toward further creativity in how we approach the digital expression of our journalism”.

A sense that the newspaper was not moving quickly enough to embrace digital reform was given in an internal “innovation report” led by Sulzberger’s son, Arthur Gregg Sulzberger, and revealed last week. The report claimed that “no traditional news organization has been more successful in the transition to digital than The New York Times” but it also concluded that “the pace of change in our industry demands that we move faster”.

Poignantly, given her departure, Abramson circulated the report with a memo to the newsroom saying that “the masthead needs to make further structural changes in the newsroom to achieve a digital first reality”. Her note was co-signed by Baquet.

Abramson has long had a reputation for abrasiveness in her dealings with colleagues. She also earned herself enemies by leveraging the departure of about 30 editors and writers including well-respected senior journalists such as Jonathan Landman now at Bloomberg View, and Jim Roberts now at Mashable.

But she also had strong supporters, and could point to a stream of journalistic successes including eight Pulitzer awards in her three years in office. The paper had notable successes including its investigation into corruption in China and the way big tech companies such as Apple conduct themselves around the world, as well as some significant reporting on the National Security Agency after the Guardian shared some of Edward Snowden’s leaked documents with the newspaper.

Nate Silver, who left the Times last July and took his FiveThirtyEight blog to ESPN, said in a tweet : “I'll always be a huge @JillAbramson fan. She did a hell of a lot more good for the New York Times than the upper management there.”

When the dust settles, attention will swing to Baquet, 57, and to the many challenges he faces in leading the newsroom. A former editor of the Los Angeles Times, he has worked for the New York Times since 2007 following an earlier stint on the paper in the 1990s.

Given one of the criticisms that have been aired against Abramson – that she was at times a little distant from the newsroom – it was notable that Baquet stressed in his first speech as executive editor that he would be a regular presence on the newsroom floor.

In a statement, he said: “It is an honor to be asked to lead the only newsroom in the country that is actually better than it was a generation ago, one that approaches the world with wonder and ambition every day. The talented journalists of The New York Times make it the greatest news operation in history and I look forward to working with them to deliver the world’s most engaging and enterprising journalism.”