Columbia Journalism Review editor defends behavior as 'normal workplace interactions' after 'baffling' firing

The former editor of the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) defended his reputation and interactions with staff following internal complaints that reportedly led to his firing last week. 

Sewell Chan, the former executive editor for the Ivy League magazine published by Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, announced on Friday that he had been dismissed by Columbia University after just eight months on the job.

The veteran journalist previously worked as editor-in-chief of The Texas Tribune and held senior roles at The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times.

"This was the first time in a 25-year career that I’ve ever been subjected to discipline in a job — much less terminated from one," he wrote in a statement posted to X. "I have immense respect for [Dean] Jelani Cobb as a journalist and educator, but the decision to let me go was hasty, ill-considered and quite frankly baffling."

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Sewell Chan said he was fired from his role as executive editor of the Columbia Journalism Review on Thursday. (Getty Images)

In his statement, Chan touted his work at the magazine before giving his account of what happened in these staff interactions in the weeks before his dismissal.

Chan said he had been brought on to "revive" CJR after it had gone without a permanent editor for nearly a year. He defended his tenure as "brief but eventful", citing how his team's reporting had garnered them recognition in the journalism industry.

He shared how he was fired just a few days after learning of staff complaints "following pointed interactions in which I provided fair and critical feedback rooted in editorial rigor."

In one of these "pointed" interactions, he explained he had raised concerns about a "significant ethical problem" with "a fellow who is passionately devoted to the cause of the Gaza protests at Columbia and had covered the recent detention of a Palestinian graduate for an online publication he had just written about, positively, for CJR."

In another interaction, he said he pressed a reporter on a deadline for a story; and the final interaction involved a staff member who refused to work in the office, despite university guidelines, or meet story quotas, he said.

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A Columbia Journalism student journalist shows off their sign as they cover anti-Israel protests at Hamilton Hall at Columbia University on April 30, 2024 in New York City.  (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

Chan defended his comments during these conversations as "normal workplace interactions" in which he provided "rigorous, fair, careful editorial oversight," which was no different from what he had done at other media outlets he had worked at.

"The norms at Columbia are apparently very different," Chan said.

Cobb, the dean of Columbia Journalism School, did not immediately return Fox News Digital's request for comment.

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