The Washington Post fired Felicia Sonmez, who sparked a heated online discussion this week about her social media policy and the public treatment of her colleagues after criticizing a fellow journalist for retweeting an offensive joke. The Post said Friday it would not comment on staffing issues. However, a copy of a letter of complaint sent Thursday denouncing her for “disobedience, harassment of colleagues on the Internet and breach of Post standards for collegiality and workplace participation” was posted on the Mediaite website and referred to others. news accounts. The honest political writer, whose second term in the Post began in 2018, declined to comment on Friday. The incident began when Sonmez uploaded a screenshot of an offensive joke that a colleague, Dave Weigel, had posted on Twitter, adding the comment: “Fantastic to work for a news agency where retweets like this are allowed.” The Post suspended Weigel for a month for his retweet, according to reports. This prompted another reporter, Jose Del Real, to criticize Sonmez online. While saying that Weigel was wrong, Del Real asked for compassion. “Gathering the internet to attack him for a mistake he made does not solve anything,” he wrote. This led to a controversial back and forth, with Sonmez accusing Del Real of attacking her. As an online discussion expanded and attracted more people, Post executive editor Sally Buzbee sent out two memos urging staff to show respect for each other. The second, on Tuesday, was tougher: Buzbee wrote that “we do not tolerate colleagues attacking colleagues either face to face or online. As it attracted more attention, few Post employees tweeted their support for the newspaper as a good place to work. Sonmez noted that these people were among the highest paid stars in the newspaper and said that there are long-standing double standards and measures in the way social media policy is applied to them. She also posted a screenshot saying Del Real had blocked her on Twitter, adding: “This is how I hear the Washington Post is a collective workplace.” While eating, another Post reporter, Lisa Rein, wrote on Twitter to Sonmez: “Please stop.” Sonmez, who worked in the early 2010s, left and came back, suing the Post and its top editors last year, accusing her of discrimination by barring her from covering sexual assault stories after she was previously reported as a victim of assault. Its termination was first reported by The Daily Beast and has been covered by the Post itself. In a letter of complaint, signed by Human Resources Officer Wayne Connell, the Post stated that by challenging colleagues’s motives, Sonmez was undermining the Post’s reputation for journalistic integrity and justice. “The same goes for your baseless mockery of our policies and practices and our commitment to a safe and supportive work environment,” he wrote. Sonmez’s union, the Washington-Baltimore News Guild, said it was committed to ensuring that employees were disciplined only for a fair purpose, but that it did not comment on individual staff issues. One Post columnist Karen Attiah wrote on Twitter on Friday that Sonmez was “always incredibly polite and supportive” of her and that he had contacted her when Attiah became the target of cyberbullying. The Morning and Afternoon Newsletters are compiled by Globe editors, giving you a brief overview of the day’s most important headlines. Register today.
