For years now we have been covering—and chuckling over—the antics and misbehavior that have been on display from alleged journalist Taylor Lorenz. Word has come out this morning that her tenure at The Washington Post has come to an end. Lorenz will be embarking on the common move these days of a media figure starting their own outlet, hers being on the popular Substack platform.

NEW — Taylor Lorenz out at Washington Post 🚨🚨🚨https://t.co/vlIeedkCI5

— Jon Levine (@LevineJonathan) October 1, 2024

The new offering will be in her usual style of coverage of the web and tech operations (she once dubbed herself “the Bob Woodward of the TikTok generation”), as she says, from the user perspective. It is not entirely clear if this was a mutual split, if she was forced out, or if she was given the chance to exit on her own terms, but she is selling this as a personal move. According to Lorenz, she really wanted to strike out on her own. Like, really, she really wanted to do this.

I just wanted to get out of legacy media. I feel like it’s just really, really difficult to do the kind of reporting that I want to do on the internet within these kind of older institutions as a primary job. I like to have a really interactive relationship with my audience. I like to be very vocal online, obviously. And I just think all of that is really hard to do in the roles that are available at these legacy institutions.

Whatever the reasoning behind her departure, it is natural to conclude that this divorce is coming as a bit of a relief for the Post. It is not made clear if this stems from her most recent controversy when she was seen in a social media post pictured at a White House event with Joe Biden in the background and a caption onscreen reading “War Criminal,” implicating Biden with that charge.

In her years at the paper, after coming over from the New York Times, Lorenz has been a regular source of headaches and embarrassment for the outlet. The hysterics from Lorenz are on display to this day as she engages in COVID-masking theatrics, claiming she is an immunity-compromised individual and decries people not bowing to her pandemic-level demands. Meanwhile she is frequently seen in close social settings going maskless while surrounded by “approved” people.

But these are petty performances on a personal level. Her professional antics have been such that questions abound concerning why the Post has tolerated her for this long. Possibly her most infamous episode was her seeking to expose the Libs of TikTok account, doxxing account holder Chaya Raichik and even appearing on the doorstep of her relatives. Her paper was also scorched when it claimed it had not published personal information—and then stealth-edited that very linked information when called out.

Lorenz soon after had another fiasco, reporting on the social media accounts that were benefitting from their coverage of the Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial. Lorenz made a number of claims in her piece about contacting those running certain accounts, and they came forward to expose the reporter as having lied about how or when she reached out to them. Her article was given not one but two major corrections and sports a lengthy editor’s note at the opening.

One result to come from these problems, eventually, was that Lorenz was essentially demoted. The move was made to remove Lorenz from the Features division at The Post and have her ensconced in the more specialized tech division. It was also stated that further submissions from Lorenz had to be vetted more thoroughly by editors before going to press. It is because of this move that on our annual Townhall-50 List of the worst in journalism, which Lorenz topped in 2022, she has steadily slid down in terms of offensive influence.

Adding to her highly questionable ethical lapses were the revelations in The Twitter Files, where it was exposed that she had enjoyed considerable influence on the platform through their pre-Elon Musk ownership. Lorenz was able to reach out and direct that certain posts and even the accounts be taken down at her behest. It also showed she was in problematic relationships with those who have been sources or subjects of her articles.

1. Twitter Provided Privileged Access to Banning Queen, Taylor Lorenz #TwitterFiles

Twitter engineer walking me through their reporting system, "Wow! She's a heavy user." pic.twitter.com/z7Y7q5OEyi

— Paul D. Thacker (@thackerpd) May 18, 2023

In one of the enduring episodes in the career of Lorenz, she appeared in an interview with MSNBC, and in trademark fashion she turned everything onto herself and her pronounced need for victimhood. She melted down on camera when discussing the hostile attentions she was receiving online, pretending these did not mirror her own history of targeting people and accounts online. When she became an internet laughingstock (such as the now-familar image of her sobbing seen in the above graphic) Lorenz lashed out at interviewer Morgan Radford for…allowing this to happen, we suppose?

Taylor Lorenz is going after woman who made that MSNBC segment that spawned a bunch of memes about her. pic.twitter.com/Mf993JmpHi

— Noam Blum (@neontaster) September 13, 2022

This conclusion leads to a paradoxical result: Ultimately, it means that to a degree Lorenz is going to be missed, while her impacted and deeply flawed work record certainly will not be longed for going forward.