Just one year after the Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes bought The New Republic, the magazine confirmed it had fired one of its top editors.
Timothy Noah, a former Slate reporter and senior editor at The New Republic, posted a tweet on Friday afternoon that read, “I just got fired from @tnr. Don’t have a clue why. Anybody got a job?”
Franklin Foer, the magazine’s editor, confirmed through a spokeswoman that Mr. Noah had been fired. He added in a statement “Tim Noah has been a strong voice for liberalism and a rigorous columnist for The New Republic. We’ve appreciated his passion and contribution to the magazine over the past two years and wish him the very best.”
Mr. Hughes, who has spent the last year revamping the near century-old publication, started to reconfigure its masthead last May. He lured back Mr. Foer to replace the magazine’s editor at the time, Richard Just. Since then, Mr. Hughes has been courting new writers to the magazine, including Walter Kirn, the author of “Up in the Air,” and Judith Shulevitz, a former editor of Lingua Franca. In January, Mr. Hughes unveiled a redesign that featured an exclusive interview with President Obama. This week, Mr. Foer said the magazine had passed the 50,000 mark for its circulation, which is a 43 percent jump from the year before.
While Mr. Noah did not respond to a request for comment, his friends on Facebook and Twitter voiced their support. One wrote, “You did nice work there. You’ll do nice work in your next gig. There’s no shame in getting fired. It happens to me all the time.”