Will Lewis will be the next CEO of Washington Post

Will Lewis, the former CEO of Dow Jones and publisher of The Wall Street Journal, will become the next CEO of The Washington Post, according to a person with direct knowledge of the decision.

The Post is expected to announce Lewis’ appointment this week, according to two people familiar with the matter.

A spokeswoman for The Washington Post declined to comment.

Mr. Lewis, 54, a British-born former journalist who was editor of The Daily Telegraph before becoming a news executive, has spent more than 15 years as a leader at major news organizations. He was most recently co-founder The news movementa start-up aimed at young news consumers.

Jeff Bezos, the founder and owner of Amazon of The Washington Post, appointed Mr. Lewis at a pivotal time for the news organization. The Post, which is on track to lose $100 million this year, has struggled to expand its digital subscription business in the years since President Donald J. Trump left office.

The editors are also gearing up to cover the 2024 presidential election, an essential story for a newspaper that prioritizes political reporting. Mr. Trump, a frequent critic of both Mr. Bezos and The Post, is playing a prominent role in the race.

Fred Ryan, The Post’s previous publisher and CEO, announced in June that he would step down after nearly a decade in the role. He led a wave of digital subscriptions and a newsroom expansion. But in recent years, subscriber growth has lost momentum, dropping to 2.5 million paid subscribers, down from about three million in 2020. The Post lost money last year after years of profitability.

In the final years of his tenure, Mr. Ryan encountered frustration among many Post executives, who felt he was presiding over a deadened business culture at the paper. He also fell out with Sally Buzbee, the editor-in-chief, over a personnel matter, and his departure was seen in the newsroom as a victory for Ms. Buzbee.

Since Mr. Ryan’s departure, the company has been led by Patty Stonesifer, a member of Amazon’s board of directors and a confidante of Mr. Bezos. Ms. Stonesifer told the newsroom in June that she expected to fill the role for six months to a year as the search for a permanent CEO was underway, and promised there would be no layoffs.

But Ms. Stonesifer later admitted that her statement about the job cuts had been “naive,” saying in an email to the newsroom last month that forecasts for growth in traffic, subscriptions and advertising had been “overly optimistic.” She told staff that as a result, The Post would cut about 240 jobs across the organization through a buyout program.

Mr Lewis’ appointment comes after a months-long recruitment process by Ms Stonesifer, who called on recruitment firm Sucherman to assess candidates. The Washington Post of Sucherman has reached out to numerous top industry figures in recent weeks, according to several people familiar with the discussions. The people included Josh Steiner, member of the board of directors of Bloomberg LP; Evan Smith, the former CEO of The Texas Tribune; Nicholas Thompson, the CEO of The Atlantic; Goli Sheikholeslami, the CEO of Politico; and Craig Forman, a former CEO of the McClatchy newspaper chain.

Puck earlier reported that Mr. Lewis was a leading finalist to become CEO of The Washington Post.

Mr Lewis was previously a reporter for The Financial Times and rose to become editor-in-chief of the Telegraph Media Group, which owns The Daily Telegraph. In 2010, Mr Lewis joined News UK, part of the empire founded by media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

There he was part of the management team charged with cleaning up a phone hacking and police bribery scandal that led to the closure of Mr Murdoch’s News of the World tabloid.

After being named CEO of Dow Jones, the parent company of The Wall Street Journal and Barron’s, in 2014, Mr. Lewis oversaw a period of digital subscription growth. At the end of Mr. Lewis’s term in 2020, the Journal had more than two million digital subscribers, up from about 700,000 when he started.

At the Journal, Mr. Lewis brought a personal touch to his interactions with the newsroom. He was known to approach some journalists with short emails expressing his support for their work.

The News Movement, the startup he has led since 2021, publishes videos about current events on popular social media platforms such as TikTok and YouTube and partners with organizations such as The Associated Press. The company has raised $15 million from backers including newspaper publisher National World and recently acquired political news startup The Recount.

Mr. Lewis was knighted this year by King Charles III for ‘political and public service’, on the recommendation of Boris Johnson, the former British Prime Minister, whom he had informally advised. Mr Lewis is also one of the candidates for the Telegraph Group, his former employer: He told Bloomberg announced in September that he had received financial support.