KAL wins his 6th Overseas Press Club Award

Kevin (KAL) Kallaugher is the winner of the 2026 Overseas Press Club Award for editorial cartooning. 

This is the sixth time KAL since 1998 that KAL has won the award. KAL’s winning portfolio spans cartoons published in The Economist, The Baltimore Sun, and his Substack, KAL Draws the Line.

"His work is pointed yet funny," stated the judges, "balancing sophisticated hard-hitting satire with belly laughs, the true mark of a great editorial cartoonist."

You can see cartoons from his winning portfolio by clicking here to go to his Substack. 

The Baltimore Sun sets for Kal

From Substack.

I am disappointed to announce that after 31 years of award-winning cartoons in The Baltimore Sun, I was abruptly dismissed from the paper on Friday.

It was just a matter of time.

In February of 2024, David Smith, the conservative owner of the Sinclair Broadcasting group purchased the struggling paper. 

As my politics do not align with the new owners, I assumed my days were numbered. 

Layoffs at SaltWire and Chronicle Herald

From The Globe and Mail.

Layoffs at Atlantic Canada’s largest newspaper chain are necessary because the properties were facing bankruptcy, according to the CEO of Postmedia Network Inc., who says his company’s purchase of the troubled assets prevented a “terrible tragedy and travesty” for the region.

In an interview Friday, days after the Toronto-based media company finalized its $1-million purchase of insolvent SaltWire Network Inc. and the Halifax Herald Ltd., Andrew MacLeod said he didn’t have specifics on how many people have so far lost their job. The situation is a “fluid process,” he said.

A day earlier, media union CWA Canada said more than 60 SaltWire staff had been laid off, while nearly 300 remained employed until their future is decided by Postmedia.

Cartoonists rally to Steve Bell's defense

From the Greek Cartoonists Association Facebook page.

The Greek Cartoonists Association strongly protests the Guardian’s dismissal of colleague Steve Bell, one of the best cartoonists in the world. 

The termination of his employment took place in the aftermath of unsupported accusations of "anti-Semitic stereotypes" in his last cartoon, accusations that the paper's management sadly adopted .

Steve Breen Leaves The Union-Tribune

From The Daily Cartoonist.

Another Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist has lost his position with his newspaper.

Steve Breen, cartoonist for The San Diego Union-Tribune, will no longer be a regular presence at the newspaper. 

The steady decline of opinion pages in newspapers

From CTV News.

Cartoon by Scott Stantis

Even during a year of sobering economic news for media companies, the layoffs of three Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonists on a single day hit like a gut punch.

The firings of the cartoonists employed by the McClatchy newspaper chain last week were a stark reminder of how an influential art form is dying, part of a general trend away from opinion content in the struggling print industry.

The demotion of political cartoons at the Washington Post

Dan Froomkin at Press Watch.

Cartoon by Pia Guerra and Ian Booothby

The Washington Post’s opinion pages were never particularly good, so the fact that they have devolved into a sad, toxic wasteland mostly inhabited by lazy neocons and right-wing reprobates is a shame, but not tragic.

What the Post opinion pages always excelled at, however, was political cartooning.

The McClatchy chain fires three editorial cartoonists

Mike Peterson in The Daily Cartoonist.

(Jack Ohman — Pulitzer Prize, 2016)

(Joel Pett — Pulitzer Prize, 2000)

(Kevin Siers — Pulitzer Prize, 2014)

The McClatchy chain of newspapers, which has been struggling in bankruptcy for more than three years, has decided to cut costs by eliminating three of the USA’s leading editorial cartoonists. 

You can click on the above links to view their Pulitzer entries. 

Cartoonist Falls for Hoax

From CTV News.

Cartoon by Dana Summers, Triune Content Agency.

The Mid Hudson News reports that the story of homeless veterans being kicked out of hotels in Newburgh in order to take in migrants was a hoax.

Seven homeless men say they were part of a group of 15 who were supposed to act as vets to keep up the scheme. 

They claim they were offered $200 for their job, which none of them ever received

Treasures of comic strip art on "Sunday Morning"

From CBS News.

An original copy of "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."

Bill Blackbeard was something of a superhero. During his lifetime, he collected and preserved 2.5 million ephemeral artifacts of comic strip art, including newspapers and Sunday color sections dating as far back as 1893. 

Treasures from his collection are now featured in a new exhibit, "Man Saves Comics," at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum at Ohio State University. 

"CBS Sunday Morning" is broadcast on CBS beginning at 9:00 a.m. ET.

"Bill Blackbeard Saves Comics!" Exhibition

From OSU Library.

MAN SAVES COMICS! Bill Blackbeard’s Treasure of 20th Century Newspapers, which mines the staggering 2.5 million items in the San Francisco Academy of Comic Art Collection, will be on view at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum.

‘Dilbert’ dropped after cartoonist’s racist rant

From The Washington Post.

Newspapers across the United States have pulled Scott Adams’s long-running “Dilbert” comic strip after the cartoonist called Black Americans a “hate group” and said White people should “get the hell away from” them.

The Yellow Kid in glorious colour

From The Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum Facebook page.

What would the iconic Yellow Kid have looked like if we only had black & white library microfilm to view him on?

In ‘Man saves comics! Bill Blackbeard’s Treasure of 20th Century Newspaper’ you can see the Yellow Kid from ‘McFadden’s Row of Flats’ on a microfilm reader as it was microfilmed from the New York Journal, November 8th, 1896.

"Drawn from the headlines" in The Globe and Mail

From Wes Tyrell's Facebook page.

The Globe and Mail introduces "Drawn from the headlines", a new cartoon feature in Saturday's "Opinions" pages.

Auditor steals baseball cartoon

From Ann Telnaes' Twitter account.

This  full-page ad for the Janice Lorrah campaign was published in the Delaware Cape Gazette. 

The original cartoon (see below), by cartoonist Ann Telnaes, was altered, uncredited and used WITHOUT PERMISSION.