Washington Post Staffers Slam Error-Laden AI Podcast Launch: ‘Total Disaster!’

AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke

The Washington Post’s push to modernize has reportedly ignited a furious backlash inside its own newsroom after an AI-generated podcast feature allegedly produced errors, outright fabrications, and unsanctioned commentary.

The tool, promoted by Post leadership as a customisable audio product for subscribers and launched two days ago, quickly unraveled once journalists began testing it.

According to internal Slack messages obtained by Semafor, staffers flagged factual mistakes, invented quotes, and editorial framing creeping into coverage.

Additional Slack messages later published by Status revealed deep unease about the consequences of the rollout.

One editor warned: “It is truly astonishing that this was allowed to go forward at all,” adding that the Post was “deliberately warp[ing] its own journalism” just days after the White House launched attacks on reporters, including Post staff, over corrections and editor’s notes: “If we were serious we would pull this tool immediately.”

“What are the guardrails to ensure accuracy in this podcast?” one staffer asked.

“Would love to hear the justification for ‘it’s product no journalism’ when we are putting words in peoples mouths, especially if it happens on an incredibly litigious and fraught coverage area like mine and journalists are the ones facing the consequences,” another wrote.

“It’s a total disaster,” one Post staffer told Status directly. “I think the newsroom is embarrassed.”

Semafor reported that the paper’s head of standards, Karen Pensiero, acknowledged in an internal message that the errors had been “frustrating for all of us” but stopped short of pulling the plug on the project.