by Jason Cohen
The Intercept is losing money amid the decision by left-wing megadonor Pierre Omidyar (pictured above) to stop providing funds to the outlet, Semafor reported on Sunday.
The Intercept is hemorrhaging around $300,000 monthly and is on pace to possess less than 1 million dollars in reserves by November, according to internal data distributed inside the outlet in March, Semafor reported. The outlet could potentially deplete its cash reserves entirely by May 2025 after Omidyar’s First Look Media decided to terminate its funding in late 2022.
Our statement on today’s layoffs at @theintercept and @firstlookmedia cc: @Michael_Bloom pic.twitter.com/IMsMEdsFvQ
— The Intercept Union (@InterceptUnion) April 6, 2022
The internal data consisted of projections of the worst possible outcome for the publication and the outlet has a “stretch revenue goal that would allow us to continue into a longer horizon,” The Intercept’s CEO Annie Chabel told Semafor.
Omidyar’s First Look was The Intercept’s parent company, but they separated, the outlet announced in January 2023. First Look gave the outlet a $14 million grant in 2022 and Omidyar helped launch The Intercept in 2014, according to Semafor.
Philanthropic contributions rose from $488,000 in 2022 to $867,000 in 2023, yet this was insufficient, The Intercept’s executives noted, according to Semafor. The outlet let go of 30% of its editorial employees in February, according to its union in March.
“I think a lot of donors care about who is in power and the power is questioned, regardless of whether it’s left or right,” Chabel told Semafor. She also said that “it’s not a surprise that there are some traditional funders who are not going to be interested in our particular brand of journalism.”
The Intercept’s coverage, which has been largely pro-Palestinian since the Israel- Hamas war, has aggravated President Joe Biden, according to Semafor.
Omidyar’s Omidyar Network and Democracy Fund allocated millions were part of a group of philanthropies allocating $200 million collectively to assist in promoting the Biden administration’s artificial intelligence agenda, according to a White House fact sheet detailing the project.
Omidyar’s Democracy Fund is part of a largely left-wing coalition of 22 groups pledging more than $500 million to fund local media publications over the course of five years, according to an announcement posted in September.
Many legacy media publications are experiencing economic struggles, Axios reported in January, with close to a dozen laying off workers as well as some dealing with employee strikes or trying to sell. For instance, The Arena Group let go of nearly the entire union staff of Sports Illustrated, while the Los Angeles Times announced it would let go of over 100 journalists as the publication bled as much as $40 million a year.
Online news outlet The Messenger also ceased operations in January after less then a year as it was losing tens of millions of dollars while only obtaining about $3 million in revenue in 2023, Axios reported, citing financial records.
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Jason Cohen is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
Photo “Pierre Omidyar” by The Omidyar Group; background photo “The Intercept Home Page” by The Intercept
