{"id":425300,"date":"2026-02-09T09:03:50","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T08:03:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=425300"},"modified":"2026-02-09T09:03:53","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T08:03:53","slug":"climate-firings-at-the-wapo-in-perspective","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=425300","title":{"rendered":"Climate firings at the WaPo in perspective"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Close-up<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

From CFACT<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Joe Bastardi<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Image<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a lot of buzz in the climate community about all the layoffs at the\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0in their climate division. From what I\u2019ve heard, roughly 75% of their climate staff have been let go. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What shocked me was learning that they actually had around 20 people working on climate coverage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How many times can you repeat the same thing over and over \u2014 and have so many people dedicated to doing it? That was the first question I asked myself when I saw the firings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How did they justify having so many people focused solely on climate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve always been a fan of the Capital Weather Gang over there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those people love the weather \u2014 even if they\u2019re probably not fans of me because of my stance on climate issues. The weather is far more important than whether the Earth will be 1\u00b0 warmer or 1\u00b0 colder in 50 or 100 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With these cuts, the climate side has now been pared down to roughly the size the weather team has always been. Even that to me has too many people focused on climate. But I guess they did their job since a lot of their readers are brainwashed and refuse to look at the other side of the issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is exactly what I wrote about in the situation with NOAA. In my opinion, the Weather Gang is a great group for people who are into weather. But they were overshadowed by an out-of-control climate division that would take any event and claim it was due to man-made climate change. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The same thing happened at NOAA: they\u2019ve done so much great work in weather forecasting, advancing warnings, and improving predictions \u2014 work that people often overlook because it was drowned out by the constant, relentless focus on climate issues. When the cuts come down, they end up impacting areas that perhaps shouldn\u2019t have been impacted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The American public is waking up. (BTW Europe should be waking up given their natural gas in some countries is teetering on the brink.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fact is, it is highly likely that CO2 does very little compared to large natural forcings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

People like me have always believed that \u2014 if there is going to be an argument at all \u2014 it is over attribution. It is almost as if the scientific community has turned into a bunch of theologians arguing over how many angels can fit on the head of a pin. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One reason for this is that it gives people a lot of attention. In what I do, every single day the weather presents a challenge, so attention is built in. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Something is happening somewhere globally, and the weather you see today began long ago. But in climate discussions, the change is so gradual that somehow people feel compelled to make it sound urgent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, they blame weather events on a changing climate, even though similar situations have happened many times before (for example, as I showed in my last blog: warming over the pole associated with major Arctic outbreaks). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If it has happened many times before, why do you now decide the reason is different? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To push an agenda, some make things up or simply lie about them. Essentially, an entire cottage industry has been driven by an agenda not centered on a love of the weather or climate, but on what the weather or climate can do to advance that agenda \u2014 often with overkill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Twenty people focused on climate? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How is that even possible, given that life today is better than ever on planet Earth?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reality is that a lot of people who want to dismantle what has made this country great \u2014 and bring us down to the level of everyone else \u2014 decided climate was a perfect vehicle for it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you can convince people that you can control the weather and climate, that you can make life better by ensuring every day is perfectly sunny with rain only at night for three hours to water the garden, and that all social ills are somehow tied to man-made climate change, then you\u2019ve got a strong case for tearing down the system that supposedly caused it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every media outlet and government agency that promoted this agenda \u2014 often with ulterior motives \u2014 finally got a reality check. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s a shame is the collateral damage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, I\u2019m seeing some things at NOAA being limited that I don\u2019t agree with \u2014 not that it matters, because no one cares what I think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My sincere wish for the\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0is this: keep the Capital Weather Gang intact. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If they want to make arguments that something is due to climate, that\u2019s fine \u2014 but weather has to come first. What they should actually do is bring me on to argue with them. Of course, that would probably lead to some brouhahas, and we wouldn\u2019t want that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a lot of buzz in the climate community about all the layoffs at the\u00a0Washington Post\u00a0in their climate division. From what I\u2019ve heard, roughly 75% of their climate staff have been let go. What shocked me was learning that they actually had around 20 people working on climate coverage. How many times can you repeat the same thing over and over \u2014 and have so many people dedicated to doing it? That was the first question I asked myself when I saw the firings. How did they justify having so many people focused solely on climate?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":425308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"Discover the impact of layoffs at The Washington Post's climate division and explore the growing discontent over climate coverage.","jetpack_seo_html_title":"Layoffs at Washington Post Climate Division: What's Next?","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvY2xpbWF0ZS1zY2llbmNlLnByZXNzXC93cC1jb250ZW50XC91cGxvYWRzXC8yMDI2XC8wMlwvQVFNNlRKc2JBOTdoV2JuMzBfQ2d3UGp2T3dYLWFnSUgxM1FzSk4tQ280c1VfMDdSbFVXTTNSLTZXQm9Td0dpaUhjMXNLTlh1RVVnUUpsT0lwU3YtdnJFdDV1TTFYNXl0ZjhTSVFKY0lzWDYwU0ZkczVRYVZDRXVpcnhMS0ZzWUwtMTAyNHg0MzIuanBlZyIsInR4dCI6IkNsaW1hdGUgZmlyaW5ncyBhdCB0aGUgV2FQbyBpbiBwZXJzcGVjdGl2ZSIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiaGlnaHdheSIsImZvbnQiOiIiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNTU4MTI0NDl9.LcGWuT4hv89DM8WePLRGZkEMW0-8voihlF80YziQKPkMQ"},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691841281,691829997,691818056,691833237,691821729,691821160],"class_list":["post-425300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-capital-weather-gang","tag-carbon-dioxide-co","tag-climate-change","tag-noaa-national-oceanic-and-atmospheric-administration","tag-washington-post","tag-weather-events","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/AQM6TJsbA97hWbn30_CgwPjvOwX-agIH13QsJN-Co4sU_07RlUWM3R-6WBoSwGiiHc1sKNXuEUgQJlOIpSv-vrEt5uM1X5ytf8SIQJcIsX60SFds5QaVCEuirxLKFsYL.jpeg?fit=1813%2C764&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1MDG","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":253560,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=253560","url_meta":{"origin":425300,"position":0},"title":"No, Washington Post, Tax Season is Not Getting Longer Due to \u2018Climate Change\u2019","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"04\/18\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"The Washington Post\u00a0(WaPo) ran a story on April 17, 2023, titled \u201cTax season is getting longer. 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