Los Angeles Times editor resigns over owner’s refusal to endorse Harris

A top Los Angeles Times editor resigned Wednesday over the owner’s refusal to endorse Kamala Harris for president.

California’s largest paper, at the direction of owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, declined to endorse anybody for president, the stance the Times took from 1976 to 2004, though it has backed Democrats in the four presidential races after that.

Mariel Garza, the editorials editor, quit in protest, saying these are “dangerous times.”

“I am resigning because I want to make it clear that I am not okay with us being silent,” Ms. Garza told the Columbia Journalism Review. “In dangerous times, honest people need to stand up. This is how I’m standing up.”

Ms. Garza said she was under no illusions that the endorsement matters electorally — the Times readership skews liberal and California is not considered a competitive state.

But in her resignation letter, also printed in the CJR, she called the decision “maybe even a bit sexist and racist.”

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“How could we spend eight years railing against Trump and the danger his leadership poses to the country and then fail to endorse the perfectly decent Democrat challenger — who we previously endorsed for the US Senate?” Ms. Garza said.

“The non-endorsement undermines the integrity of the editorial board and every single endorsement we make, down to school board races. People will justifiably wonder if each endorsement was a decision made by a group of journalists after extensive research and discussion, or through decree by the owner,” she added.