Gerard Baker

Baker was educated at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, United Kingdom and holds a degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (first class honors).[1][3][4] Baker is a British citizen.[5] He was left-of-center during his university years,[5][6] and was elected as a Labour vice-president of the student union.[6] He subsequently moved towards the right.[5][6] Media critic David Carr of the New York Times described Baker as "a neoconservative columnist of acute political views."[7]

Baker's first job following graduation was at the Bank of England, United Kingdom.[4][6] After working there for a year, Baker moved to Lloyds Bank as a Latin America Analyst.[6]

From 1988 to 1994, Baker worked for the BBC as a Producer in the UK and in the U.S., and worked as Economics Correspondent for television and radio.[1] From 1994 to 2004, Baker worked for the Financial Times. From 1994 to 1998, he worked as their Correspondent in Tokyo, Japan; from 1998 to 2002, he worked as their Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief; and from 2002 to 2004, he worked as their Chief U.S. Commentator and Associate Editor.[1] From 2004 to 2009, Baker worked for the Times of London as their U.S. Editor and as an Assistant Editor.[1]

In January 2009, Baker moved to Wall Street Journal, becoming the Deputy Editor-in-Chief.[8][3] On 1 March 2013, he was named the Dow Jones Managing Editor, and the Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief.[1]

Baker describes himself as a "right-wing curmudgeon."[4] As deputy editor-in-chief, Baker (then serving as Robert James Thomson's lieutenant) replaced Journal reporters and bureau chiefs who they felt were too liberal.[9] Baker "openly mocked Barack Obama and what he saw as the turgid style of American journalists."[10] Baker holds euroskeptic views, arguing against closer European integration.[11][12]

Ryan Chittum, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, criticized Baker in the Columbia Journalism Review as "an Iraq War-cheerleading neocon, goofball Obama ridiculer, and author of some of the wrongest commentary of the financial crisis."[13] Chittum highlighted several of Baker's previous writings, including a column in the Financial Times in 2003 in which Baker mocked French opposition to the Iraq War, and a column in the Times of London in 2006 in which Baker argued that "we are going to have to get ready for war with Iran."[13]

Baker's tenure at the Journal was a tumultuous one, with buyouts, layoffs, and discontent among some reporters.[14] In 2015, the Journal began a new round of large-scale layoffs of reporters and staff.[15][16] Some sections of the paper's print edition, including Greater New York, were cut, while others were consolidated.[14] The Journal also undertook "a sweeping newsroom strategy review" called WSJ2020, in a bid to save $100 million in costs.[14] As editor, Baker also mourned the death of Journal reporter David Bird, who had been missing and whose body was later found in a river.[17][18] In November 2015, Baker was one of the moderators at the fourth Republican primary debate during the 2016 presidential primaries.[8] He is the first Briton to moderate a U.S. presidential debate.[19] Baker's performance became popular on social media,[20][21] with the Daily Telegraph reporting that Baker had "bemused" and "flummoxed" America.[22]

In 2016 and 2017, the Journal leadership under Baker came under fire from critics, both from the outside and from within the newsroom, who viewed the paper's cover of President Donald Trump as too timid.[14] Particularly controversial was the Journal's November 2016 front-page headline that repeated Trump's false claim that "millions of people" had voted illegally in the election, without noting that this statement was inaccurate.[14] Also controversial was a January 2017 note from Baker to Journal editors, directing them to avoid using the phrase "seven majority-Muslim countries" when writing about Trump's executive order on travel and immigration; Baker later sent a follow-up note "clarifying that there was 'no ban'" on the phrase, "but that the publication should 'always be careful that this term is not offered as the only description of the countries covered under the ban.'"[14] At a town-hall-style meeting with Journal staff in February 2017, Baker defended the paper's coverage, saying that it was objective and protected the paper from being "dragged into the political process" through a dispute with the Trump administration.[14]

On June 5, 2018, the Journal announced that Baker would step down as editor in chief and step into the role of editor at large, effective July 11, 2018. Matt Murray will be succeeding Baker as editor in chief.[2]