Los Angeles Times Editorial Writer: Why I Resigned Over the Endorsement Call (Guest Column)

When I was abruptly laid off from the Los Angeles Times in June 2023 by a form email – no call, no meeting, no personal touch, just a mass email sent to some 74 employees – I spent time wondering whether the newspaper’s management was so dysfunctional that it no longer knew how to carry out a simple staff reduction, or whether it simply didn’t care about basic courtesy toward its people, including one like me who had been writing and/or editing for the paper since 1989.

Now I have my answer.

As it turned out, I was hired again four months later for a temporary stint to help with election season, which takes a tremendous amount of time and research to produce responsibly. Election endorsements are so important to readers that subscriptions jump every time they are published. Eventually, the temporary stint led to an offer to rejoin the editorial board permanently.

I have spent exactly half my life working for the Times. Then, last week, I suddenly resigned because of the cockup (a polite term for how I feel) about not endorsing Kamala Harris. And I am not going back.

Understand, I respect owner Patrick Soon-Shiong’s right to interfere with editorials; that is one place where he ethically can do so. It’s hardly the first time in my 22 years of writing editorials for the Times. Publisher/CEO Eddy Hartenstein wanted an editorial on for-profit trade schools ripping off students, and he was right. Another publisher, Jeff Johnson, wanted to know why we shouldn’t endorse legislation to put the L.A. schools under some form of mayoral control; after listening to my reasoning, he took my side. Sometimes I’ve agreed with the outcomes, sometimes not. But I never remotely considered quitting over them.

This is far different. If Soon-Shiong had decided early last spring that he no longer wanted to endorse on presidential races, that would have been fair, neutral and legitimate. An odd decision, not to weigh in on the most crucial election in my lifetime, but his call. But by making the decision at the 11th hour, when the candidates are in place, polls are tight and almost anything can throw the race one way or the other, Soon-Shiong’s anti-editorial stance is actually a de facto decision to do an editorial — a wordless one, a make-believe-it’s-invisible one that unfairly implies grievous faults in Harris that put her on a level with Donald Trump. Soon-Shiong is, whether he realizes it or not, practicing the opposite of the neutrality he professes to seek.

An endorsement for Harris would change little; the editorial board has been critical of Donald Trump for eight years, which never seems to have bothered the owner. It is a progressive board in a Democratic state, Harris is a Californian. So an endorsement was the natural next step. Not endorsing her is the surprise move that throws shade on her, shade that could harm her in wobblier states. The stakes are too big for that kind of monkeying.

The conviction that I would resign formed and hardened when Soon-Shiong posted on X about his idea for the board to do a neutral analysis of the pros and cons of Harris and Trump during their White House tenures.

The news side already does an outstanding job of neutral reporting and analysis. It has been providing key information all along. That’s not an editorial. Editorials use good analysis to take a stand. That’s precisely why we have a separate opinion staff from the news staff. Who would put any credibility into this “neutral” analysis when the board has been railing against Trump for so long? (Though I have given him credit for opening more federal jobs to people without a bachelor’s degree in 2020; that is not an original Harris idea). Besides, how do we compare the performance a vice president with that of a president? Those are two completely different jobs. It would be like comparing apples and, well, an orange.

And why this sudden passion for neutrality and avoiding divisiveness on the editorial page? We had by that time rendered our stance on 45 races. Soon-Shiong spent extra money to bring me back on staff to help produce those opinions. Suddenly, on the presidential race, we become neutered — sorry, neutral — reciters of facts?

In that post, the owner wrote the infuriating words that “the Editorial Board chose to remain silent.” It’s completely untrue and reads like a convenient attempt to throw exactly the wrong people under the bus. At no point did anyone on the board choose to remain silent. He blocked our voice, leading to the resignations of nearly half of the editorial board. That’s his prerogative, but in that case, at least OWN it.

Karin Klein is the author of two books including the newly published Rethinking College: A Guide to Thriving Without a Degree (HarperCollins) and worked for the Los Angeles Times for 35 years, the past 22 of those as a member of the editorial board covering education, health and science.