The Root (magazine)
The Root is an African American–oriented online magazine launched on January 28, 2008 by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Donald E. Graham. In October 2025, it was acquired by Watering Hole Media.
History
The Root was launched on January 28, 2008, by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Donald E. Graham, under the ownership of The Washington Post Company. When its online subsidiary, The Slate Group, was created that June, The Root was placed under this new subsidiary.Sold to Univision Communications in 2015, it was subsequently re-launched under the Kinja platform used by other websites under Gizmodo Media Group.
In July 2017, the blog Very Smart Brothas, co-founded by Damon Young and Panama Jackson, became a vertical of The Root.
In April 2019, The Root became part of the newly-created G/O Media, following the purchase of Gizmodo Media Group from Univision by Great Hill Partners.
Danielle Belton was editor-in-chief at The Root between 2017 and 2021, when she was appointed editor of HuffPost. On April 14, 2021, it was announced that Belton was succeeded by Vanessa De Luca as editor-in-chief. De Luca in turn was succeeded by Tatsha Robertson on June 22, 2023.
Since April 2021, The Root has seen substantial staff turnover, with 15 out of the 16 full-time staffers resigning following internal tensions, with former staff member Michael Harriot saying that, "as a staff, we came to the conclusion that, basically, The Root is over." These departures were part of a wider conflict between G/O Media and its other outlets that saw staff also resigning across these outlets.
With the sale of Kotaku in July 2025, The Root stood as the last remaining outlet in the G/O Media portfolio, the company having individually sold all of its outlets since 2023. Ashley Allison's company Watering Hole Media acquired The Root in October 2025; Allison is a Democratic political strategist and CNN commentator.