Rupert Murdoch is bringing his New York Post to the West Coast.
In something of a surprise announcement Monday, News Corp. said that it will launch a new daily newspaper in Los Angeles early next year called The California Post, expanding on the brand of the nation’s most-read tabloid.
Besides being based in Los Angeles, the new outlet will feature what News Corp. is describing as a “robust staff of editors, reporters and photographers dedicated to covering news, entertainment, politics, culture, sports and business,” adding that the paper will cover the news from a “distinctly Californian perspective.”
“Los Angeles and California surely need a daily dose of The Post as an antidote to the jaundiced, jaded journalism that has sadly proliferated,” News Corp. CEO Robert Thomson said in Monday’s announcement.
“We are at a pivotal moment for the city and the state, and there is no doubt that The Post will play a crucial role in engaging and enlightening readers, who are starved of serious reporting and puckish wit,” Thomson added.
Thomson has tapped veteran journalist Nick Papps to be The California Post’s editor-in-chief. Papps, who will report to the New York Post’s top editor Keith Poole, has experience reporting in California as he served as News Corp Australia’s West Coast correspondent for nearly three years.
With the new addition to The New York Post Media Group, which was already home to the Post, Page Six and Decider, Thomson said that Poole’s duties and oversight have now grown.
“I am also pleased that Keith Poole’s remit is expanding, as he will now be responsible for covering not just New York, but California, the U.S., the world and, perhaps, Mars,” he quipped.
“This is the next manifestation of our national brand,” Poole said. “California is the most populous state in the country, and is the epicenter of entertainment, the AI revolution and advanced manufacturing—not to mention a sports powerhouse. Yet many stories are not being told, and many viewpoints are not being represented.”
He added: “With The California Post, we will bring a common-sense, issue-based approach to metropolitan journalism. We’ll tell the stories that our readers care about the most, but others overlook, and we’ll do so with clarity and our trademark conviction, across print, digital and the platforms where audiences live today.”
According to News Corp., Los Angeles is home to the second-largest concentration of Post readers – and California as a whole accounts for over seven million unique visitors a month to the paper’s digital sites. On top of that, 90 percent of the Post’s digital audience lives outside the New York area.
The new California Post, which is scheduled to go live in early 2026, will include a daily print edition as well as dedicated web pages. The paper will also feature national coverage from the New York Post that is relevant to California readers.
Based on the mock-up front pages the Post unveiled in its announcement of the new venture, the California Post will replicate the right-wing populist tone and tenor the Murdoch-owned tabloid is known for. It also appears that Page Six, the paper’s influential gossip section, will be featured in the Golden State publication, based on the mock images.
“Our content is read everywhere from the corner store to the corner office,” NYPMG CEO Sean Giancola said, referencing the New York Post’s status as America’s oldest newspaper.
“We are trusted by millions for our direct and plain-spoken approach to news, and The New York Post has been the voice of the people in New York for 200 years,” he added. “California is a vibrant, dynamic market where our unique journalistic ethos will resonate and engage audiences in meaningful ways.”
It would also appear that News Corp. thinks the financial and editorial struggles thatThe Los Angeles Times has faced in recent years — which have seen hundreds of staffers laid off and an increasingly low newsroom morale — present an opening for the Post to take some of that market.
