The editorial board, which is composed of veteran journalists and editors who operate separately from the newsroom, has endorsed every presidential race since 2008. There was no indication from the owner, Patrick Soon-Shiong, a biotech billionaire who bought in 2018, that we should change course this election season. Indeed, in early September I received an email from him expressing his interest in seeing presidential approval before publishing.

Readers expected it too, though not because it was a mystery who we’d be rooting for. Endorsements aren’t just slogans, they’re carefully researched and argued pieces that make a compelling case for a candidate based on the facts and their record. While we didn’t expect to change many minds with this one, we thought it was important to make the strongest possible case that Harris was not only a bulwark against the fascism that the second Trump administration has created, but that he would be an excellent commander in -boss.

Inexplicably and absurdly, that never happened. After waiting weeks to get a definitive response from the owner on our request to approve, the editorial team collaborated on a last-minute call on why it was critical to take action and presented an outline showing what we would say Among the reasons I gave were the very real threats to democratic institutions, reproductive rights, and freedom of the press if Harris didn’t win.

Incredibly, on October 11th, the executive editor told me that Soon-Shiong had rejected our proposal. At that point, what should have been a routine and entirely expected endorsement turned into a national story that undermined the credibility of the newsroom’s work and tarnished the reputation of the entire organization.

This was not the October surprise I would have predicted. We knew that not endorsing it would not change the outcome of the vote in California, where Harris has a healthy lead. What kept me up at night was the fear that it might be misconstrued in other parts of the country. This election is likely to be based on a handful of swing states. Would voters in Nevada, Arizona or Pennsylvania mistakenly conclude that Harris’ hometown paper had such serious reservations about her after all these years of sounding the alarm about Trump that it couldn’t -recommend it to the voters?

That was unbearable for me and led my decision to resign Wednesday. I couldn’t bear the idea that this decision could influence the outcome of the most important election of my life. Two of my editorial colleagues—Robert Greene and Karin Klein—followed suit the next day.

Unfortunately, this story was repeated at The Washington Post two days later, when the editor abruptly announced the decision not to endorse this or future presidential races, saying that readers are able to make up their own minds. Soon-Shiong also made this argument, although both papers were approved in other races this year. The Post’s decision was reportedly made by Jeff Bezos, another billionaire newspaper owner.

I don’t expect we will ever get an honest answer to what motivated the owners of these two papers to kill the Harris claims (conflict and dishonesty). Sorry later issued by Soon-Shiong and his daughter aside). I’m afraid it comes down to money. I’ve been on editorial boards for more than 20 years, and in my experience, when editors intervene in approvals, it’s usually for financial reasons. And both have substantial business interests that could suffer under a vindictive Trump administration.

Many newspapers have opted out of presidential endorsements, usually out of fear of losing readers. That’s good; a case must be made that approvals and editorial boards are anachronisms. But making this change just days before the election is not an honest move towards neutrality. That’s a statement in itself.

If there’s any upside to this shameful moment, it’s that the owners of these two newspapers inadvertently illustrated the dangers of a second Trump term in stronger terms than we could have done in any endorsement (or the five-part series I planned to supplement it Harris approval, which was also increased).

If two of the richest men in the world are so scared of a Trump presidency that they would muzzle journalists and damage their two news organizations rather than use their considerable resources to prevent it thing, every voter should rush in terror to the nearest polling station on November 5.

Mariel Garza was an editorial writer at the Los Angeles Times until last week.