Philadelphia Inquirer’s executive editor steps down after ‘Buildings Matter, Too’ headline

The Philadelphia Inquirer's executive editor is stepping down after his newspaper ran a headline reading "Buildings Matter, Too" that garnered widespread backlash.

June 12 will be the last day for the newspaper’s top editor, Stan Wischnowski, CNN reported, citing a memo shared with the Inquirer’s staff. His replacement has not been announced.

Dozens of journalists for the newspaper called out of work last Thursday, two days after the headline ran in print amid public demonstrations and social unrest following the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, in police custody in Minneapolis.

The headline — referencing Black Lives Matter — in Tuesday’s paper accompanied a column denouncing the destruction of buildings in Philadelphia amid the unrest.

The newspaper apologized on Wednesday for running a headline that “suggested an equivalence between the loss of buildings and the lives of black Americans.”

An open letter signed by 44 journalists for the Inquirer said the staff is tired of “working for months and years to gain the trust of our communities — communities that have long had good reason to not trust our profession — only to see that trust eroded in an instant by careless, unempathetic decisions."