Karen Attiah must be reinstated by The Washington Post and receive back pay after an arbitrator ruled the newspaper lacked sufficient cause to fire the opinion columnist over her social media posts following the ******* assination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
Arbitrator Sarah Miller Espinosa found the Post "did not have good and sufficient cause" to terminate Attiah and failed to establish that she engaged in "gross misconduct," according to a decision obtained by The New York Times. Attiah was fired by the Post in September after posting about Kirk's killing on Bluesky.
"This decision confirms what we've said from the start: I was doing my job as an opinion writer, and this was wrongful termination," Attiah said in a statement, adding that she was "relieved to finally have that record set straight."
Attiah told the Times that she was "willing to go back" to the Post, which she called "one of the world's most storied newspapers." A Washington Post spokeswoman told the Times that the company respects the arbitration process and declined to comment further.
Attiah was fired after posting on Bluesky about the reaction to Kirk's ******* assination. In one post, she wrote, "Refusing to tear my clothes and smear ashes on my face in performative mourning for a white man that espoused violence is … not the same as violence."

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