How Jeff Bezos Is Trying to Fix The Washington Post

The Amazon founder has expressed his support to Will Lewis, the C.E.O., who has faced widespread criticism this month.

When The Washington Post’s staff gathered in the newsroom in early May to celebrate winning three Pulitzer Prizes, one person was conspicuously absent: Will Lewis, the company’s publisher and chief executive.

That’s because Mr. Lewis was in New York meeting with Jeff Bezos, the billionaire founder of Amazon and owner of The Post, who was in the city to attend the Met Gala, according to two people with knowledge of the meeting.

The pair had been discussing a reorganization aimed at helping The Post turn around its business. That included creating a “third newsroom” inside The Post to focus on new editorial products, an idea blessed by Mr. Bezos, according to one of those people and another familiar with the talks.

Mr. Lewis’s decision this month to go ahead with that plan has shaken The Post. Sally Buzbee, the paper’s executive editor, abruptly resigned, upsetting many in the newsroom. Since then, revelations about Mr. Lewis’s response to a years-old scandal have raised questions about his ethics before and after he joined The Post — and even questions about whether he would survive in his job.

So far, Mr. Bezos appears to be standing by Mr. Lewis, who joined the paper this year. Mr. Bezos recently expressed his support for Mr. Lewis during one of their periodic conversations, according to two people with knowledge of the interaction.

Mr. Bezos’ decisions to reshape The Post underscore the central role he is playing at the paper he bought for $250 million more than 10 years ago. Mr. Bezos spends more time on other projects, including his space company, Blue Origin, leaving the day-to-day operations and editorial strategy to the chief executive and top editors. But he is ultimately The Post’s most important figure.