For Immediate Release: Jan. 6, 2025
Contact: Jen Sheehan, jen@nyguid.org, 610-573-0740
Times Guild leaders send statement to Times management showing their full support for the Athletic organizing.
NEW YORK – Editorial staff at The Athletic announced Monday that they have organized with The NewsGuild of New York and are asking The New York Times to recognize them as part of the newsroom union, The Times Guild.
The Athletic’s organizing committee sent an email on behalf of about 200 Athletic U.S.-based editorial staff to Times Publisher AG Sulzberger and CEO Meredith Kopit Levien, requesting that they recognize them as part of the Times Guild.
“We are proud of all that The Athletic and The New York Times as a whole has accomplished since our 2022 acquisition, and we know that our inclusion in the Times Guild will only further strengthen our work,” the letter says.
The Times acquired The Athletic, an online sports news outlet, in 2022. Despite management’s assertions that The Athletic’s operations would be separate, they have been integrated into the newsroom.
On Sept. 18, 2023, Times management closed the award-winning New York Times Sports Desk and the work was shifted to Times staff assigned to The Athletic.
Leadership of The Times Guild, which represents nearly 1,500 workers in the newsroom as well as business and support staff, sent a statement to Times management on Thursday to express their full support of their coworkers at The Athletic.
“We urge the company to recognize what has been true since the company began publishing The Athletic’s work under the banner of The New York Times: We are one newsroom, and our colleagues at The Athletic are Times Guild members,” they wrote.
Katie Strang, a senior investigative writer for The Athletic, is among those urging Times management to include them in the bargaining unit.
“Over the past several months, we have organized around the principle of preserving what makes The Athletic great — our staff, our work and our loyal readership,” Strang said. “The work we do is union work and we believe we should be afforded the same benefits and protections as the Times Guild members under their current contract.”
Should the Times choose not to recognize The Athletic’s request to be part of the Times Guild, The NewsGuild of New York will pursue other legal pathways.
“The Times must recognize these workers as part of the Times Guild.” said Susan DeCarava, president of The NewsGuild of New York. “We will not support a two-tier system that disenfranchises workers and undermines our members, nor will we accept management’s charade that The Athletic is a separate entity.”
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ABOUT THE NEWSGUILD OF NEW YORK
The NewsGuild of New York, Local 31003 of the Communications Workers of America, is a labor union representing nearly 6,000 media professionals and other employees at New York area news organizations, including The New York Times, Condé Nast, The New Yorker, Thomson Reuters, The Atlantic, The Nation, PEOPLE, and The Daily Beast. The NewsGuild of New York advocates for journalists to have a voice in the newsroom, for press freedom, for inclusive and diverse workplaces, and for just cause, no exceptions, for all media professionals.