After The Washington Post laid off more than 300 journalists in February, several local and national news outlets based in the nation’s capital announced expansions to fill coverage gaps. Among newsrooms vying to step up where the Post was ceding ground, NOTUS emerged as the most ambitious. In March, it announced plans to double its staff, starting with hiring several former Post reporters; in April, leadership confirmed it would rebrand as “The Star” and relaunch in June.
But it turns out NOTUS isn’t the only rising media star in town. The Washington Star, a conservative-leaning newspaper that shut down in 1981, has started publishing again under media executive and New York Sun publisher Dovid Efune, The New York Times reported Thursday.
Efune previously revived The New York Sun after it shut down in 2008, and claims it is profitable today, per the Times. The Washington Star has begun publishing on Substack, and Efune told the Times’ Katie Robinson that he aims to have a website live in the next two months and publish a weekend print newspaper by the end of this year. He also said he plans to hire up to 50 full-time journalists and contributors.
Robert Allbritton, The Star’s backer, has ties to the reanimated newspaper, too; his father owned The Washington Star. He told the Times he’s not worried about the similar names confusing readers, adding, “The Washington Star has been gone for 50 years now, so it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense that they’re bringing it back.”
Meanwhile, Efune told Robinson the launch of the new Star “accelerated our timeline to scale up.”
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