Journalist Taylor Lorenz is coming under fire for her comments in the wake of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson's slaying last week. Reportedly, Vox Media is ending its contract with the journalist's podcast and YouTube show.
The move comes amid Lorenz's apparent celebration of Thompson's death. Earlier this month, she took to BlueSky to laud the slaying of Thompson in New York on December 4. At the time, she retweeted a post about Blue Cross Blue Shield's refusal to cover anesthesia for the entirety of particular surgeries, to which she replied:
"And people wonder why we want these executives dead."
Her comments didn't end there.
Taylor Lorenz comes under fire for suggesting that healthcare executives deserve poor insurance plans, here's what we know
As reported by Newsweek, in another post, Taylor Lorenz tweeted "ENDORSE" to someone's suggestion that claimed healthcare executives should be pushed to opt for the cheapest insurance plans their company presents to them.
On December 5, she uploaded a Substack blog post titled "Why 'We' Want Insurance Executives Dead." She claimed she represented the general "public sentiment" involving Thompson's demise:
"Let me be super clear: my post uses a collective 'we' and is explaining the public sentiment. It is not me personally saying 'I want these executives dead and so we should kill them,'" Lorenz penned. "I am explaining that thousands of Americans (myself included) are fed up with our barbaric healthcare system and the people at the top who rake in millions while inflicting pain, suffering, and death on millions of innocent people."
"If you have watched a loved one die because an insurance conglomerate denied their life-saving treatment as a cost-cutting measure, yes, it's natural to wish that the people who run such conglomerates would suffer the same fate," she went on.
As for Vox Media's distribution deal, which was first reported by Semafor scribe Max Tani, Taylor Lorenz hopped on social media on Monday to rubbish the claims as “100% false,” noting that all the reports were a “lie." She also promised to dish more details on her podcast this week.
“This is 100% false and I’m very much still working with Vox, and my show is not up for ‘renewal’ because I actually own 100% of the show and control the distribution, not Vox. Media reporters continue to lie about me! Tune into the pod this week where I’ll discuss :),” she wrote on X.
Semafor also revealed that the columnist got into a short-term contract with the company, one that is reportedly expected to come to an end next year. While Vox has yet to issue a statement, per The New York Post, a spokesperson for Semafor pushed back, saying:
“As Max Tani accurately reported, Vox is ending its relationship with Taylor Lorenz in 2025. You can read that story here.”
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It remains to be confirmed if Taylor Lorenz's partnership with Vox Media has come to an end.
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