Susan Glasser was named the editor at Politico on Thursday, rising from her job as editor of its magazine to oversee all its Washington-based journalism and take a hand in the company’s strategy as it expands across the United States and into Europe.
Politico’s executive editor, Richard L. Berke, resigned earlier this month, citing strategic differences with the site’s founders, John F. Harris and Jim VandeHei. Ms. Glasser’s position is above that role, she said, with full authority “over Politico and its journalism, hiring and firing and all that stuff.” As a replacement for Mr. Berke, she will appoint someone who will supervise day-to-day news operations, as well as a new editor for the magazine.
Ms. Glasser, 45, said her goal for Politico was to make it “a first read for anyone whose business is Washington, and for the millions of other people who are captivated by what is happening here.” The journalism she wants to do, she said, “is authentic, independent and it’s as original as possible.”
Politico plans an expansion both nationally and into Europe, where it has teamed up with the German publisher Axel Springer. “One of the big reasons she’s in this job,” Mr. VandeHei said in a phone interview, “is this is a huge expansion for us, and we need someone like Susan in the newsroom to oversee the editorial. We’re a bigger company, and we have bigger ambitions, and you’ve got to have a leadership team in place.”
One of the issues that led to Mr. Berke’s resignation, according to people with knowledge of the situation, was his lack of authority to make the moves he thought necessary, including autonomy over staffing — precisely the power Ms. Glasser will now have. Mr. VandeHei declined to comment directly on the issue, but said that he had appointed Ms. Glasser because she “is not only a fantastic journalist, she’s a fantastic strategic thinker.”
“It’s so much harder to break through today,” Mr. VandeHei said, “so you have to be smarter and even more ambitious. We want to keep it growing and growing and growing.”
The site will most likely make more hires for its leadership roles, he said.
An earlier version of this article, and the accompanying headline and picture caption, misstated Ms. Glasser’s new role at Politico. She is editor, not “the top editor.” (John F. Harris is its editor in chief.)
Because of an editing error, an earlier version of the online summary with this article misstated Ms. Glasser’s role. She will now oversee all Washington-based content; it is not the case that she will not oversee that content.