Felicia Sonmez is an American journalist based in Washington, D.C. Felicia Sonmez is a national reporter on The Washington Post's breaking political news team. In January 2020, she was suspended after posting a link to an article about sexual assault allegations against Kobe Bryant in the aftermath of Bryant's death. ^{[2] [1] [3] [7][5] [8] [9] [10] [16]}

Felicia Sonmez schooled at from Harvard University in 2005 with a Bachelor's degree in government. ^[2]

From 2010 to 2013, she reported on national politics for The Washington Post, starting as a writer for The Fix and going on to cover Congress, the 2012 presidential campaign and the early days of President Barack Obama’s second term. ^[2]

She began her career teaching English in Beijing, China and has also covered U.S. politics for the Asahi Shimbun and National Journal's the Hotline. ^[2]

On January 26, 2020, hours after the death of Kobe Bryant, Felicia Sonmez posted a link to a 2016 The Daily Beast report headlined “Kobe Bryant’s Disturbing Rape Case”. ^{[5] [6]}

Her since-deleted tweet sparked outrage — with Sonmez saying that “10,000 people” had commented and “emailed me with abuse and death threats."

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“Well, THAT was eye-opening,” she wrote about the barrage of hate mail, stressing that she was not connected with the article she tweeted, screenshots of the messages show.

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“Any public figure is worth remembering in their totality even if that public figure is beloved and that totality unsettling,” she insisted.

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She sent another tweet detailing some of the harassment — one of which included a screenshot of her work email highlighting the abuse she was getting, according to the reports.

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Washington Post managing editor Tracy Grant confirmed to the Daily Mail that the political reporter was “placed on administrative leave” while the paper reviewed whether her Bryant tweets “violated The Post newsroom’s social media policy.”

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“The tweets displayed poor judgment that undermined the work of her colleagues,” Grant told the news site.

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Sonmez later deleted the offending messages.

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