A.G. Sulzberger is an American journalist responsible for the surge of anti-transgender coverage in the New York Times from 2018 onward.
No transgender journalist has appeared on the New York Times masthead since its founding in 1851.
Background
Sulzberger’s family has controlled the New York Times since 1896.
Arthur Gregg Sulzberger was born August 5, 1980 in Washington, DC. After attending private school in New York, he earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Brown University in 2003. He worked at the Providence Journal from 2004 to 2006, The Oregonian from 2006 to 2009, and The New York Times starting in 2009. He was soon named an associate editor and began publishing internal reports on long-term business strategy. In 2016 he was named deputy publisher. He beat out his cousins Sam Dolnick and David Perpich to succeed his father as publisher in 2018, then was named chair of The New York Times Company in 2021.
Sulzberger’s anti-transgender policy and strategy
In 2023, hundreds of Times staffers signed a letter expressing concern about anti-trans coverage under Sulzberger’s leadership.
GLAAD also presented a letter with notable signatories that had three requests:
- STOP: Stop printing biased anti-trans stories.
- LISTEN: So many trans people are wary of the Times, and do not trust the Times. Hold a meeting with transgender community members and leaders, and listen throughout that meeting.
- HIRE: Genuinely invest in hiring trans writers and editors, full time on your staff.
Via Daily Beast:
Nozlee Samadzadeh, a computer programmer with the Times, posted a screenshot of an email she wrote to Times publisher A. G. Sulzberger that said she has lost trust in management over its defense that those who criticized the Times’ trans coverage engaged in “advocacy.”
“To dismiss yesterday’s letter from Times contributors… is disrespectful to the very journalists whose work we’ve chosen to publish,” she wrote. “And on the very next day to publish Pamela Paul’s piece on JK Rowling, someone whose platform is big enough not to need our ‘defense’ and who has caused very real harm to the trans community, is difficult not to interpret as a provocation.”
In May 2023, Sulzberger responded to these criticisms in the Columbia Journalism Review:
More recently, we’ve heard similar arguments about journalism putting lives at risk emerging from our coverage of the debates inside the medical community over care for transgender children. Critics have accused our work of “‘both sides’ fearmongering and bad-faith ‘just asking questions’ coverage” and have suggested that even acknowledging a broader range of views on this topic has legitimized—wittingly or not—a repressive legal effort to undermine the rights and the safety of a group that faces significant prejudice. “The pretense of objectivity—the newsroom ideal that all ‘sides’ of an issue should be heard—often harms marginalized people more than it helps them,” wrote one critic of our coverage. “If you say ‘I want to live,’ and I say ‘No,’ what happens next isn’t a debate; it’s murder.”
The Times has covered the surge of discrimination, threats, and violence faced by trans, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming people, including the rapidly growing number of legislative efforts attacking their rights. We’ve also covered the many ways in which people challenging gender norms are gaining recognition and breaking barriers in the United States and around the world. Yet our critics overlook these articles—and there are hundreds of them—to instead focus on a small number of pieces that explore particularly sensitive questions that society is actively working through, but which some would prefer for the Times to treat as settled.
References
Bolies, Corbin (March 7, 2023). The New York Times’ Trans Coverage Debacle Was Years in the Making. The Daily Beast https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-the-new-york-times-trans-coverage-debacle-was-years-in-the-making
Bolies, Corbin; Cartwright, Lachlan (February 16, 2023). New York Times blasts staffers who condemned paper’s trans coverage. The Daily Beast https://www.thedailybeast.com/new-york-times-blast-staffers-who-condemned-papers-trans-coverage
Reilly, Patrick (February 15, 2023). New York Times accused of ‘editorial bias’ in coverage of transgender issues. New York Post https://nypost.com/2023/02/15/new-york-times-blasted-for-editorial-bias-in-transgender-coverage/
Eckert, AJ. What the New York Times gets wrong about puberty blockers for transgender youth. Science-Based Medicine https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/what-the-new-york-times-gets-wrong-about-puberty-blockers-for-transgender-youth/
Sulzberger AG (May 15, 2023). Journalism’s Essential Value. Columbia Journalism Review https://www.cjr.org/special_report/ag-sulzberger-new-york-times-journalisms-essential-value-objectivity-independence.php
USPATH and WPATH respond to NY Times article “They Paused Puberty, But Is There a Cost? published on November 14, 2022 (PDF). https://www.wpath.org/media/cms/Documents/Public%20Policies/2022/USPATHWPATH%20Statement%20re%20Nov%2014%202022%20NYT%20Article%20Nov%2022%202022.pdf
Urquhart, Evan (November 17, 2022). The NYT’s big piece on puberty blockers mucked up the most important point about them. Slate https://slate.com/technology/2022/11/puberty-blockers-side-effects-controversy.html
Oladipo, Gloria (February 18, 2023). Nearly 1,000 contributors protest New York Times’ coverage of trans people. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/17/new-york-times-contributors-open-letter-protest-anti-trans-coverage
Migdon, Brooke (February 15, 2023). NYT contributors blast paper’s coverage of transgender people. The Hill. https://thehill.com/homenews/media/3859501-nyt-contributors-blast-papers-coverage-of-transgender-people/
Yurcaba, Jo (February 16, 2023). N.Y. Times contributors and LGBTQ advocates send open letters criticizing paper’s trans coverage. NBC News. https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-news/ny-contributors-lgbtq-advocates-send-open-letters-criticizing-papers-t-rcna70800
Paul, Larisha (February 15, 2023). Gabrielle Union, Tommy Dorfman, more accuse NYT of ‘Harmful’ coverage of trans people. Rolling Stone. https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/new-york-times-coverage-of-trans-people-open-letter-1234680299/
Kalish, Lil. These New York Times contributors say the paper’s coverage of gender issues is hurting trans people. BuzzFeed News. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/lilkalish/trans-writers-open-letter-nyt-biased-coverage
Hays, Gabriel (February 15, 2023). Celebs rip into New York Times for ‘irresponsible’ transgender coverage: Demand end to ‘both sides’ focus. Fox News. https://www.foxnews.com/media/celebs-rip-new-york-times-irresponsible-transgender-coverage-demand-end-both-sides-focus
Dunlap, David W. (June 19, 2017). How The Times gave ‘gay’ its own voice (again). The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331.
Klein, Charlotte (February 15, 2023). Nearly 200 New York Times contributors are denouncing the paper’s anti-trans coverage. Vanity Fair. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/02/new-york-times-trans-coverage
Davies, Rachel (February 16, 2023). The NYT knew what it was doing with its ‘Defense of J.K. Rowling’. The Mary Sue. https://www.themarysue.com/the-nyt-knew-what-it-was-doing-with-its-defense-of-j-k-rowling/
Warrington, James (February 16, 2023). How the New York Times was engulfed by a trans culture war. The Telegraph. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/02/15/new-york-times-accused-writers-anti-trans-bigotry/
Mastrangelo, Dominick (February 16, 2023). NYT editors: Paper ‘will not tolerate’ its journalists protesting coverage of transgender people. The Hill. https://thehill.com/homenews/3862101-nyt-editors-paper-will-not-tolerate-its-journalists-protesting-coverage-of-transgender-people/amp/
Smith, Ben (October 18, 2022). Inside the identity crisis at The New York Times. Semafor https://www.semafor.com/article/10/18/2022/inside-the-identity-crisis-at-the-new-york-times
Remnick, David (December 22, 2017). A conversation with A.G. Sulzberger, the new leader of the New York Times. New York https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-conversation-with-a-g-sulzberger-the-new-leader-of-the-new-york-times
Ember, Sydney (December 14, 2017). A.G. Sulzberger, 37, to Take Over as New York Times Publisher. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/14/business/media/a-g-sulzberger-new-york-times-publisher.html
Barron, James (October 20, 2016). A.G. Sulzberger: leading change at The New York Times as journalism evolves. The New York Times. http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2018/02/ag_sulzberger_new_york_times_p.html
Rogoway, Mike (February 9, 2018). A.G. Sulzberger, New York Times’ publisher and former Oregonian reporter, talks journalism in the digital age. The Oregonian.
Wemple, Erik (December 14, 2017). A.G. Sulzberger to assume publisher role at New York Times on Jan. 1. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2017/12/14/a-g-sulzberger-to-assume-publisher-role-at-new-york-times-on-jan-1/
Benton, Joshua (May 15, 2014). The leaked New York Times innovation report is one of the key documents of this media age. NiemanLab. https://www.niemanlab.org/2014/05/the-leaked-new-york-times-innovation-report-is-one-of-the-key-documents-of-this-media-age/
Snyder, Gabriel (February 12, 2017). The New York Times claws its way into the future. Wired. https://www.wired.com/2017/02/new-york-times-digital-journalism/
Levitz, Eric (October 19, 2016). A.G. Sulzberger Vanquishes His Cousins, Becomes Deputy Publisher of the New York Times. New York. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/10/a-g-sulzberger-becomes-deputy-publisher-of-new-york-times.html
Benton, Joshua. This is The New York Times’ digital path forward. NiemanLab. https://www.niemanlab.org/2017/01/this-is-the-new-york-times-digital-path-forward/
Sulzberger, A. G. (October 7, 2015). Our Path Forward (PDF). The New York Times Company. https://nytco-assets.nytimes.com/m/Our-Path-Forward.pdf
Sulzberger, A. G. (January 1, 2018). A Note from Our New Publisher. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/01/opinion/Arthur-Gregg-Sulzberger-The-New-York-Times.html
Resources by Sulzberger
New York Times Company (nytco.com)
Twitter (twitter.com)
LinkedIn (linkedin.com)
Resources about Sulzberger
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)
IMDb (imdb.com)
New York Times open letter (nytletter.com)