Washington:
An award-winning political cartoonist for The Washington Post has announced her resignation after a cartoon showing the newspaper’s billionaire owner cringing before Donald Trump was dismissed.
Ann Telnaes posted on Substack late Friday that this was the first time she “had a cartoon killed because of who or what I pointed my pen at.”
The cartoon – which she included in her post – shows Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and Washington Post owner, as well as Facebook and Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg and other media and technology moguls, kneeling and holding up bags of money in front of a huge Trump.
Also shown is an outstretched Mickey Mouse, the symbol of the Disney Company, owner of ABC News. The television network recently reached a $15 million settlement with Trump after he filed a defamation suit over coverage of his sex abuse trial in New York.
Telnaes wrote that although previous sketches of hers had been rejected, this was the first time this had happened because of her ‘point of view’.
“That’s a game changer… and dangerous for a free press,” she said.
The Washington Post, with the slogan “democracy dies in darkness,” said Telnaes’ work had not been rejected because of any “evil force.”
“We had just published a column on the same subject as the cartoon and had already scheduled another column – this one a satire – for publication,” Editorial Page editor David Shipley said in a statement. “The only bias was against repetition.”
The US media aggressively covered Trump’s chaotic first term, which included two impeachment trials and ended with his refusal to acknowledge defeat in the 2020 election – culminating in a mob of his supporters storming Congress.
As Trump prepares for his Jan. 20 inauguration after defeating Vice President Kamala Harris in November, there are signs that top CEOs, including in the media, are eager to build good relationships.
A stream of top tycoons, from Apple CEO Tim Cook to Bezos Zuckerberg, have traveled to meet Trump at his Florida estate.
Elon Musk, owner of the influential social media platform X and the richest person in the world, is one of the president-elect’s closest advisors.
Amazon and Meta have both announced $1 million donations to Trump’s inauguration fund, as Apple’s Cook reportedly did in his personal capacity.
Bezos caused a stir just before the presidential election when he broke with long-standing tradition and spoke out against the Post supporting a candidate.
Telnaes, who has won the Pulitzer Prize and other awards for her work, has worked for the Post since 2008.
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)