David Pecker Out as Chief of National Enquirer Publisher

In 1999, Mr. Pecker was part of a group, led by Evercore Partners, that bought American Media for $294 million. Chatham became an owner of American Media in 2014.

Years before Mr. Trump became a political force, The Enquirer had a flirtation with respectability: In 2010, the administrators of the Pulitzer Prize determined that the tabloid was eligible for its awards after it had submitted investigative articles that uncovered the extramarital affair and out-of-wedlock fatherhood of John Edwards, a former senator and presidential candidate.

Amid the “catch and kill” investigation relating to the 2016 campaign, Mr. Pecker met with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia as part of American Media’s attempts to strike business deals in that nation. American Media also published a glossy magazine in the crown prince’s honor, a 100-page tome filled with splashy photos of him smiling or shaking hands with President Trump.

The magazine appeared on newsstands in the spring of 2018, when Prince Mohammed went on a tour of the United States that included visits with moguls and celebrities such as Rupert Murdoch, Michael R. Bloomberg and Mr. Bezos. In October that year, assassins strangled the Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote opinion articles for The Washington Post, at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul and dismembered his body using a bone saw.

With Mr. Pecker no longer leading the renamed American Media, Chatham has put some distance between itself and the company’s rocky recent past. Taking Mr. Pecker’s place at the helm is Chris Scardino, an 18-year veteran of American Media, who was named the president of A360Media.

In his memo on Friday, Mr. Parry, the Accelerate chief executive, provided facts about the company to A360Media workers who may never have heard of it under the heading “Can you tell me more about Accelerate?” As part of the answer, he wrote, “American Media and Accelerate are currently sister companies under common ownership.”

In its news release, Accelerate said it had “recently launched a successful line of personal protection equipment that includes hand sanitizer, gloves, disinfectant wipes, cloth and disposable face masks, P.P.E. safety packs and immunity boosting supplements.”

Jim Rutenberg contributed reporting.