Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson of Semafor interviewed Thomson Reuters CEO Steve Hasker about his thoughts on the news service.

Edgecliffe-Johnson writes, “The Thomson family’s well-timed sales of its Fleet Street newspapers, North Sea oil assets, and US textbook business earned it a reputation as one of the media industry’s savvier portfolio managers. But its unsentimental approach to once-prized assets has also ensured periodic speculation over the future of Reuters.

“‘We assess every part of the portfolio for its fit, for its performance, and that includes Reuters. If I were to sit here and say Reuters is off-limits, I think that would be disingenuous,’ Hasker says. But he adds that the group has done ‘a lot of good work’ in finding areas where the newsroom’s expertise can benefit its legal, tax and accounting, and corporate clients.

“Thomson Reuters’ position in the news business can invite scrutiny that few other professional publishers face, however. In February, President Donald Trump claimed that ‘Radical Left Reuters’ had been paid $9 million by the Department of Defense, and demanded that it return the money.

“The furor — stoked by Elon Musk when he was hunting for inefficient spending to eliminate in Washington — mischaracterized a contract with a unit called Thomson Reuters Special Services that serves law enforcement and defense agencies and is run separately from the news organization. Hasker defends Reuters’ independent journalism and says that it has retained ‘the vast majority’ of its government contracts. But he adds that the resilience of a newsroom whose journalists regularly report from active war zones puts such crises in context. ‘That’s one of the benefits of having Reuters in the portfolio. Everyone else looks [at Reuters] and says, ‘OK, that’s how you behave under fire.’’”

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