49 lines
4 KiB
Markdown
49 lines
4 KiB
Markdown
---
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category: "Private Organization"
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aliases:
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- "The Washington Examiner"
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tags:
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- Organization
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- Media
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- Journalism
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- WashingtonDC
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- Anschutz
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summary: "Washington political publication built from suburban Journal Newspapers, which Philip Anschutz bought through his new Clarity Media Group in 2004 and relaunched as a free daily in 2005."
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start: 2005
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location: "Washington, D.C., USA"
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relations:
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- type: owned
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with: "[[Philip Anschutz]]"
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reverse: true
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start: 2004
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fn: 1
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- type: owned
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with: "[[Clarity Media Group]]"
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reverse: true
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start: 2004
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fn: 1
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created: 2026-09-23
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updated: 2026-09-23
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---
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The Washington Examiner is a political publication in [[Washington, D.C.]] owned by the Denver billionaire [[Philip Anschutz]]. It grew out of Journal Newspapers Inc., the [[Alexandria, Virginia]] publisher of the *Northern Virginia Journal*, the *Prince George's Journal* and the *Montgomery Journal*, which Anschutz bought in 2004.[^1] It launched as a free paper in 2005.[^2]
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### Anschutz purchase
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On September 30, 2004 Anschutz, a founder of [[Qwest Communications]] and an investor in [[D.C. United]], announced the purchase of Journal Newspapers through [[Clarity Media Group]], "a newly created investment arm" headed by the former [[Denver Post]] publisher [[Ryan McKibben]] and the paper's former chief financial officer Frederick Anderson. Clarity did not disclose financial terms. Anschutz also owned the *[[San Francisco Examiner]],* a majority stake in [[Regal Entertainment Group]] and four [[Major League Soccer]] teams. The three suburban dailies had a combined circulation of 115,000 and had passed through several owners and heavy layoffs; Clarity said it would add "regional, national, and world news" while keeping the free tabloid format. McKibben said: "I'm not going to say the Washington Times or The Washington Post is our competition."[^1]
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### Examiner chain
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Anschutz had bought the *San Francisco Examiner* for 11 million dollars in 2004 and extended its "Eagle" masthead to his other Examiner papers. By June 2009 the *Washington Examiner* distributed 260,000 copies on Thursdays, with advertisers including [[Macy's]], [[Southwest Airlines]] and [[Citibank]], and Clarity had closed its *Baltimore Examiner*. That month the sale of *[[The Weekly Standard]]* to Anschutz was announced; Dirk Smillie of *[[Forbes]]* wrote that the magazine lost an estimated 5 million dollars a year on a circulation of 80,000.[^2]
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### Coverage of effective altruism
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In November 2025 the Examiner reporter [[Robert Schmad]] published "Effective Altruism-linked nonprofit placed fellows in key government offices, secured influence," on the [[Horizon Institute for Public Service]], followed in April 2026 by "Documents show how a tech-connected nonprofit shaped Biden-era AI policy."[^3][^4] In December 2025 *[[Semafor]]* noted a critical Examiner piece on the donor ties of the [[Tarbell Center for AI Journalism]].[^5]
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### Footnotes
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[^1]: Shin, Annys. "Anschutz Purchases Journal Newspapers." *The Washington Post,* October 1, 2004, p. E02. http://web.archive.org/web/20180128120921/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63529-2004Sep30.html
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[^2]: Smillie, Dirk. "The Stealth Media Mogul." *Forbes,* June 29, 2009. https://www.forbes.com/2009/06/28/anschutz-weekly-standard-business-media-examiner.html
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[^3]: Schmad, Robert. "Effective Altruism-linked nonprofit placed fellows in key government offices, secured influence." *Washington Examiner,* November 6, 2025. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/3874805/effective-altruism-linked-nonprofit-placed-fellows-in-key-government-offices-secured-influence/
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[^4]: Schmad, Robert. "Documents show how a tech-connected nonprofit shaped Biden-era AI policy." *Washington Examiner,* April 17, 2026. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/investigations/4532389/
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[^5]: Tani, Max. "AI critics funded AI coverage at top newsrooms." *Semafor,* December 7, 2025. https://www.semafor.com/article/12/07/2025/ai-critics-funded-ai-coverage-at-top-newsrooms
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