Two of the leaders in blow-by-blow Washington news will join forces, with the Roll Call Group buying Congressional Quarterly for an undisclosed price, the companies announced on Tuesday.
The companies have been competitors, with considerable overlap in what they cover, but their various print and online publications will be preserved, said Laurie Battaglia, who will retain the title of managing director and executive vice president of the Roll Call Group when it becomes the CQ-Roll Call Group.
“Those are all products that have very separate and distinct voices and they need to maintain separate and distinct voices,” she said. Some duplicative jobs could be eliminated, she said.
Coverage of official Washington is an increasingly competitive field, with operations like National Journal, The Hill and Politico, as well as newspapers and other mass media.
CQ was owned by The Times Publishing Company, owner of the St. Petersburg Times; Times Publishing is itself owned by the nonprofit Poynter Institute. CQ publishes CQ Weekly, the daily CQ Today when Congress is in session and electronic newsletters like CQ Budget Tracker. It also produces a monthly magazine, Governing, about state and local governments, which Times Publishing will keep.