Editor’s Column: Our Rival, The State, Took a Hit. I’m Still Rooting for It.
Allow me to quote myself from 2020: “No, the news didn’t make me happy.”
I wrote those words when I was editor of Free Times, the scrappy alternative newspaper that spent its days nipping at the heels of the big, bad State — the daily that has covered Columbia since 1891.
I was reacting to the news that McClatchy, the chain that owns The State and roughly 30 other papers across the country, had filed for bankruptcy and was about to be taken over by the hedge fund Chatham Asset Management. Last week, the kind of day many of us feared when that news broke finally arrived.
On Sept. 10, McClatchy laid off more than 90 staff members, cutting some newsrooms by as much as 40 percent, according to Poynter. At least 13 papers in eight states lost journalists. The State lost five.
The cuts are the latest blow in a years-long contraction of local news, a trend that has left many communities with fewer watchdogs and more government meetings going uncovered.
I’m back in The Post and Courier’s Columbia newsroom, overseeing news efforts that include Free Times and a more robust Midlands report. That puts us in constant competition with The State.
During the four years between my stints here, I spent two years as a reporter and editor at that other paper. I know intimately how vital a force it is in the Columbia news market.
The battle for scoops between two long-standing news brands, The Post and Courier and The State, has made us both sharper. Readers have benefited through more thorough coverage of the Midlands.
I stand by what I said in 2020: “I want to keep doing our dance — trying to beat each other to stories, pushing each other each day to be better with our coverage — forever.”
Our dance partner took a hit this week. So did local journalism in the United States.
Beyond the number of jobs lost, the journalists who were cut raise serious questions about McClatchy’s commitment to supporting well-rounded local newsrooms.
“Some of the cuts have raised questions about what types of journalism the company values,” Poynter’s Angela Fu wrote. She noted that The Charlotte Observer’s only data reporter said on Bluesky that she was cut. The Fresno Bee, which had seven layoffs, lost multiple accountability reporters, according to Pacific Media Workers Guild executive officer Michael Applegate. The Miami Herald, which had 20 layoffs and eliminated 10 vacant positions, lost its city of Miami and city of Miami Beach beats, deputy investigations editor Carol Marbin Miller said.
Ariane Lange, an investigative reporter at company flagship The Sacramento Bee, called it “the bloodiest round of layoffs in quite some time at McClatchy.”
I’ll let The State News Guild, the union that represents the paper’s newsroom, sing the praises of the journalists losing their jobs in Columbia.
I worked beside all five of them. They’re great. If you’re an editor with an opening, you should hire them.
Democracy, as it has been said repeatedly, dies in darkness. McClatchy’s cuts made the light a little dimmer, shrinking the number of journalists holding governments and institutions to account across the country.
But there are still good journalists in Columbia, fighting fiercely to give readers important information about the place we call home. We’re keeping up the fight here at The Post and Courier Columbia and Free Times.
And there are still talented journalists keeping up the fight at The State.
I’ll keep rooting for them even as I keep trying to beat them. You should, too.