The Los Angeles Times, the hometown newspaper of Vice President Kamala Harris, will not provide a presidential endorsement in 2024.
It is disrespectful to Harris that the paper does not endorse her. The Times supported Barack Obama in 2012 and 2008, Hillary Clinton in 2016, and Joe Biden in 2020.
Max Tani of Semafor stated on Tuesday that Dr. Patrick Soon-Shion, the paper’s owner, decided not to support Harris.
“According to two insiders, the executive editor Terry Tang told board staff this month that the newspaper would not endorse a candidate in the election, a choice that came from the newspaper’s owner Dr. Soon-Shiong, a former medical doctor.”
Although it stated at the bottom of its web endorsement page that “the board endorses selectively, selecting the most consequential elections in which to make recommendations,” the publication did not provide an explanation for its choice.
This would not be the first time that Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, the paper’s owner, has defied the editorial board’s demands since he purchased the publication in 2018. The paper conducted interviews with Democratic presidential contenders in 2020 with the goal of selecting one of them. However, Soon-Shiong abruptly deviated from its leadership and said that there would be no candidate endorsement in the primary after deciding to support Elizabeth Warren in the Democratic primary (the publication endorsed Joe Biden in the general election).
The publication stopped supporting politicians when Richard Nixon was reelected in 1972 and resigned as president during Watergate. The Times had supported Nixon during his House, Senate, and presidential campaigns. Nixon was a Republican from California. About thirty years later, in 2008, it received its next endorsement.
