Cartoonist Who Quit After Washington Post Wouldn’t Run Bezos-Trump Cartoon Wins Pulitzer Prize

A former Washington Post editorial cartoonist won a Pulitzer Prize on Monday, four months after resigning from her position because of the publication’s stance on her art critiquing billionaire media executives’ subservience to President Donald Trump.

Ann Telnaes won in the Illustrated Reporting and Commentary category for “delivering piercing commentary on powerful people and institutions with deftness, creativity – and a fearlessness that led to her departure from the news organization after 17 years,” according to the Pulitzer Prize announcement.

The finalists in the category included Ernesto Barbieri and Jess Ruliffson of The Boston Globe and Iran Martinez, Steve Breen, Jamie Self and Giovanni Moujaes of inewsource.org in San Diego.

Telnaes’ work also won her the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning. Likewise, she was also a Pulitzer Prize finalist for illustrated reporting and commentary in 2022.

Telnaes began working for The Washington Post in 2008. However, in January, she publicly parted ways with the publication after a dispute about her work, which she explained in a post on Substack.

“I have had editorial feedback and productive conversations—and some differences—about cartoons I have submitted for publication, but in all that time I’ve never had a cartoon killed because of who or what I chose to aim my pen at. Until now,” she wrote.

“To be clear, there have been instances where sketches have been rejected or revisions requested, but never because of the point of view inherent in the cartoon’s commentary. That’s a game changer…and dangerous for a free press,” she warned.

Telnaes published a draft of the cartoon in question on the Substack article. It depicted five individuals — including Washington Post owner, Jeff Bezos; Facebook and Meta founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg; Open AI CEO Sam Altman CEO; Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong; and the Walt Disney Company/ABC News, illustrated as Mickey Mouse — bending the knee to a giant figure atop multiple steps, presumably President Donald Trump.

Several of the individuals in the image were holding up money to the figure, while Mickey Mouse was completely kneeling on the floor. One of the individuals in the image was holding lipstick and puckering its lips as if to kiss the throne, the ground, or the giant figures’ shoes.

Ahead of the 2024 election, The Post announced that it would be breaking with the publication’s decades-long tradition of endorsing a presidential candidate. The move resulted in a loss of 250,000 subscribers and multiple resignations at the outlet.

While critics slammed the decision, arguing that no endorsement in this election was in fact an endorsement of Trump and his harmful policy proposals, billionaire WaPo owner Jeff Bezos, who also founded Amazon and Blue Origin, claimed it was necessary to thwart any public perception that the outlet is biased.

“We must be accurate, and we must be believed to be accurate,” Bezos wrote in an opinion piece in October. “It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but we are failing on the second requirement. Most people believe the media is biased. Anyone who doesn’t see this is paying scant attention to reality, and those who fight reality lose.”

Trump has since applauded Bezos for his work at The Washington Post.

“I think a guy like Bezos has … I’ve gotten to know him. I think he’s trying to do a real job. Jeff Bezos is trying to do a real job with The Washington Post, and that wasn’t happening before,” Trump claimed in March.

HuffPost reached out to both Telnaes and The Washington Post for comment.

The Washington Post also won a Pulitzer in the Breaking News Reporting category this year for its coverage of the July assassination attempt against Trump.