The newspaper New York Times announced on Tuesday that the current deputy director, journalist Joe Kahn, will replace Dean Baquet at the head of the prestigious New York media starting in June.
Kahn, 57, will be tasked with cementing the digital future of the Times, a leading liberal voice in the world journalismat a time when it seeks to retain its audience in a polarized and partisan world.
“We want to commit to being independent,” said Khan, who has been number two at the Times since 2016. He is credited with leading the paper into the digital age.
In recent years, the new york newspaper it has opted for podcasts and television documentaries, although its crossword puzzles and games section has become another important source of income.
Kahn, who also led the newspaper’s international coverage, shared a 2006 Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the situation in China.
For his part, Baquet was the first black director of the Times and during his years at the helm, the newspaper won 18 Pulitzer Prizes.
During this period, he dealt with the coverage of the presidency of the Republican government Donald Trump (2017-2021) and had several scoops on the tycoon’s finances, as well as the sexual abuse case involving Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, the rise of the Black Lives Matter anti-racist movement or the war in Syria.
But it also faced some controversy, including an internal investigation that found the award-winning podcast “Caliphate” failed to meet editorial standards.
The New York newspaper assured that Baquet has reached the age at which the directors of the Times usually retire: 65 years. However, he will continue in the diary to “direct a new adventure”.
