R.I.P. Teen Vogue

Written By Alexis Faible

In early November, it was announced that Conde Nast was shutting down Teen Vogue. They stated that Teen Vogue would be absorbed into the Vogue.com umbrella, and in the process, they laid off six editorial staffers, most of whom were trans people or women of color. Reportedly, this leaves just one woman of color on Vogue’s entire journalism staff.

A Political Publication

When Teen Vogue was founded by then editor-in-chief Anna Wintour in 2003, it was not meant to be a political publication. Conde Nast instead promoted the magazine as showcasing fashion, beauty, and style, which they felt had been “ignored by other teen publications obsessed with sex, relationships, and celebrities.” 

However, in the 2010s, the magazine transformed into a political powerhouse. One of the most popular Teen Vogue articles ever, that paved the way for the transition, was the 2016 article “Donald Trump is Gaslighting America.” This op-ed went viral, and the publication dedicated the following years to hiring diverse staff and continuing to cover political events. 

“I always felt that the ‘teen’ label kept people from realizing how impactful their journalism was,” wrote journalist Alyssa Goldberg for USA Today. 

In recent years, Teen Vogue interviewed the mayor of NYC, Zohran Mamdani, and was the first to speak with Greta Thunberg after her imprisonment in an Israeli prison. They covered topics like Black Lives Matter and Trans identity. Just earlier this year, the publication won the 2025 Freedom of Speech and Expression award granted by the Roosevelt Institute. 

“Shuttering the magazine as an independent brand feels like giving in-sending a false message that journalism specifically by and for young people isn’t important,” continued Goldberg.

Freedom of Speech

Infamously, in September of this year, Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show was suspended for comments Kimmel made about actual pile of garbage, Charlie Kirk’s death. Brendan Carr, the Trump-appointed chair of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), was so upset by these mild comments that he threatened to take action against Disney, the parent company of ABC, over them. Hours later, ABC said it would be suspending Kimmel’s show indefinitely. This suspension didn’t last long, of course, and Kimmel was back on the air less than a week later. 

For many, this was the first time they noticed Trump’s attempt to limit the First Amendment, freedom of speech. However, it was not the first attempt. Trump’s already filed defamation lawsuits against The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, and has reached settlements with ABC and CBS. At the FCC, Trump’s puppet Carr has used his influence to target diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and strip federal funding from NPR and PBS. 

According to the NewsGuild of New York and Conde United, the majority of the six staff members who were laid off are BIPOC women or trans, including Teen Vogue’s politics editor. Vogue now has no writers or editors explicitly covering politics, and only one woman of color on the editorial staff.

“I think the decision to shutter Teen Vogue and move it to the safer home of Vogue, which is very much a fashion magazine — they're not known for their political coverage — reflects a larger cultural sensibility that is pulling away from robust critique of these policies that Trump is enacting,” University of Calgary associate professor Jessalynn Keller told CBC News.

The union that represents the staffers who were laid off from Teen Vogue agrees with Keller’s assessment. Stating “The NewsGuild of New York and Condé United strongly condemn Condé Nast’s consolidation plans for Teen Vogue, a move that is clearly designed to blunt the award-winning magazine’s insightful journalism at a time when it is needed the most.” They also added that this “Continues the trend of layoffs at Condé Nast disproportionately impacting marginalized employees."

Versha Sharma, the former editor-in-chief of Teen Vogue, also posted this to Instagram after the announcement.

“The Teen Vogue shut down is not random; it’s a reminder. When institutions collapse or shift away from justice-centered storytelling, it’s always Black, queer, feminist, and community-rooted creators who feel it first. But it’s also those same communities who have always built the alternative pathways that keep our stories alive,” wrote Diandra Marizet on Instagram. 

The shutdown of Teen Vogue is nothing new; it is simply the latest in a long list of publications and companies that are willing to bend to Trump’s will for fear of retaliation. Companies all across the country, like Target, have been getting rid of their DEI programs and initiatives and dissolving their sustainability teams, such as Nike, for fear that they will be added to Trump’s long list of targets. 


“Considering that Conde Nast also owns Wired, Ars Technica, and The New Yorker, we should worry that they’ll be next,” wrote one Reddit user.

What Now?

“We have this idea that social media has democratized the internet, but in actuality, these platforms are corporate-owned, for-profit sites —  like magazines, in a way, however, they're run by algorithms. Social media platforms aren't guided by journalistic ethics or other kinds of professional standards that journalists abide by — fact-checking, for instance,” says Keller. 

So…what now? With publications afraid to speak up or being shuttered against their will, we may have to rely on other forms of media to get our news. As Keller said, social media can be a lawless place, but it’s one that most people are turning to. 

As Marizet wrote in her Instagram post, “From liberation newspapers to today’s indie zines and digital publications, community-driven media has never stopped doing what mainstream outlets often refuse to do: protect our narratives, nurture our agency and tell the truth about our lives.”

I encourage you to continue supporting news outlets that aren’t afraid to speak out against Trump and the current regime. To follow independent journalists and publishers that you trust, and to always always fact-check any information you receive. 

Lex McMenamin, a staffer also recently let go from Teen Vogue, took to Bluesky to share the GoFundMe for those laid off by Teen Vogue. 

thank you for the outpouring of support! those of us laid off from Teen Vogue yesterday are now sharing our GoFundMe to help us cover our emergency expenses now that we've lost our incomes, as we get back on our feet.

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— Lex McMenamin (they/them) (@lexmcmenamin.com) November 4, 2025 at 3:17 PM
Alexis Faible
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