Inside the Automattic Power Struggle: Matt Mullenweg’s Ouster, Slack Takeover, and Dramatic Return

By: Tech & Corporate Governance Desk
Published: September 2026

Main Facts

The corporate landscape surrounding Automattic—the commercial force behind WordPress, Tumblr, and WooCommerce—has experienced one of the most turbulent weeks in its history. WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg has officially reclaimed his position as Chairman and CEO of Automattic, following a brief, chaotic, and heavily publicized boardroom coup that lasted less than 72 hours.

The drama began on Wednesday, September 9, when Automattic’s Board of Directors abruptly suspended Mullenweg, placing him on paid leave and installing Chief Financial Officer Mark Davies as interim CEO. However, the boardroom’s attempt to wrest control of the company quickly unraveled. Due to what appears to have been an oversight in credential revocation, Mullenweg retained access to the company’s internal Slack workspace. Utilizing this access, he bypassed traditional corporate communication channels to declare his reinstatement directly to the workforce.

By Saturday evening, September 12, an official company spokesperson confirmed Mullenweg’s return. Yet, the manner of the confirmation—featuring a decidedly informal, single-sentence statement that bore the unmistakable stylistic fingerprint of Mullenweg himself—has left industry analysts questioning the true dynamics of power inside Automattic’s executive suites.

Chronology of Events

To understand how a Silicon Valley-style coup collapsed in a matter of days, it is necessary to examine the timeline of events that unfolded between September 9 and September 12.

Wednesday, September 9: The Boardroom Ouster

The crisis ignited on Wednesday morning when Automattic’s Board of Directors convened an emergency meeting. Matt Mullenweg was given a mere 50 minutes of prior notification regarding the gathering. During the meeting, he was informed that he was being placed on paid leave for unspecified reasons.

Mullenweg’s immediate request for a delay to allow legal counsel to review the board’s maneuver was swiftly denied. With swift and clinical precision, the board appointed CFO Mark Davies to the chief executive seat. Shortly thereafter, Automattic published a formal, highly polished three-sentence corporate statement:

"Matt Mullenweg is currently on leave from Automattic. Mark Davies, Automattic’s CFO, will lead the company as interim CEO. The Board has full confidence in Mark’s leadership and in the team’s ability to execute against the company’s priorities."

At this juncture, the board appeared to have total control over the narrative, the executive infrastructure, and the public relations apparatus.

Thursday, September 10: Behind-the-Scenes Mobilization

While the corporate world digested the news of Mullenweg’s sudden removal, internal channels within Automattic began to buzz. Supporters of the co-founder realized that while his corporate email and administrative privileges might have been restricted, his access to the company’s internal Slack workspace remained intact. Employees loyal to Mullenweg, alongside key figures in the broader open-source WordPress ecosystem, began mobilizing on social media platforms like X (formerly Twitter).

Friday, September 11: The Slack Insurgency

By Friday morning, the situation took a bizarre turn. Mullenweg logged into Automattic’s internal Slack workspace, systematically stripped hostile administrators of their privileges, and posted a series of messages declaring that he was back in control of the company.

Tech outlets scrambled to cover the unprecedented insurrection. Headlines reflected the widespread confusion over whether Mullenweg had genuinely seized back control or was merely staging a high-stakes, digital protest. As TechCrunch famously framed it: "Matt Mullenweg tells (trolls?) Automattic staff, saying he’s back in control after CEO ouster."

Adding fuel to the fire, Mary Hubbard, the Executive Director of the WordPress project, publicly threw her weight behind Mullenweg via social media:

"I’m relieved and pleased to see Matt Mullenweg return as CEO of Automattic, the largest financial contributor to the WordPress project. Having WordPress’s Co-founder and Project Lead at the helm gives me confidence that their support will remain strong. Matt has my support."

Encouraged by these developments, numerous Automatticians (as employees of the company are known) began flooding social media with statements supporting Mullenweg. True to form, Mullenweg reposted these messages, effectively creating a decentralized digital shield that drowned out the initial narrative of his ouster.

Saturday, September 12: The Official Reversal and Unorthodox Statement

The climax of the drama arrived just after 5:00 PM EST on Saturday, September 12. A spokesperson for Automattic issued a new official statement regarding the CEO’s status. However, the tone, structure, and word choice bore zero resemblance to the formal corporate press release issued just days prior:

"Matt Mullenweg is the chairman and CEO of Automattic, with full support of the board and if you search online you can see many top executives and Automatticians supporting him as well."

With this single, run-on sentence, the board’s interim leadership dissolved, and Mullenweg’s reinstatement was finalized—leaving observers to wonder whether the board had capitulated entirely to the charismatic co-founder’s internal rebellion.

Supporting Data and Comparative Analysis

The linguistic whiplash between Automattic’s two official statements offers a fascinating case study in corporate communication under duress.

Statement One: The Corporate Standard (Wednesday, Sept. 9)

• Tone: Formal, detached, and bureaucratic.
• Perspective: Written strictly in the third-person.
• Structure: A crisp, three-sentence paragraph designed to project stability, legal grounding, and institutional authority.
• Function: To inform stakeholders of a decisive governance action taken by the Board of Directors.

Statement Two: The Manifesto Style (Saturday, Sept. 12)

• Tone: Informal, defensive, and conversational.
• Perspective: Direct assertion aimed at refuting doubt rather than simply stating a policy.
• Structure: A single, sweeping run-on sentence that includes an argumentative call to action ("…and if you search online you can see…").
• Function: To project defiance and force public consensus by pointing to online employee sentiment.

Industry analysts widely agree that while the first statement was crafted by corporate legal counsel and public relations professionals, the second statement was likely dictated, edited, or authored verbatim by Mullenweg himself as a condition of his triumphant return.

Official Responses and Internal Sentiment

The corporate coup and subsequent digital counter-offensive elicited strong reactions from both within the company and across the broader web ecosystem that relies on WordPress.

Long-term employees and industry veterans quickly rallied around Mullenweg to signal business continuity. Among them was James Grierson, who shared his decade-long experience working alongside the CEO:

"I have worked alongside @photomatt first as a contributor and sponsor for 10 years while at Bluehost and then as a co-worker at @automattic for the last 10 years. The future of Automattic and WordPress are bright, and I am excited for the next 10 years!"

These sentiments were echoed by scores of other Automatticians, who utilized social media to validate Mullenweg’s leadership. The unified front presented by the workforce created an untenable position for the interim leadership under Mark Davies, rendering the board’s original decision politically and operationally unviable.

Implications for Automattic and the WordPress Ecosystem

While Matt Mullenweg has successfully re-established his dominance over Automattic, the events of September 2026 carry profound long-term implications for the company and the wider open-source community.

1. Questions of Corporate Governance

The most glaring takeaway from this week-long saga is the vulnerability within Automattic’s internal security and governance protocols. The fact that an ousted CEO could retain administrative access to the company’s primary communication channel (Slack) and leverage it to mount a successful counter-coup highlights a staggering lapse in operational risk management. Investors and board members will undoubtedly face difficult questions regarding how such a flawed ouster was planned and executed in the first place.

2. The Power of Founder-Led Control

Automattic is a private company, but its fortunes are deeply intertwined with WordPress—software that powers over 40% of the top 10 million websites globally. Mullenweg’s identity is synonymous with the platform. This crisis proved that in founder-led tech companies, institutional boards often underestimate the deep, cult-like loyalty employees and community stakeholders hold for the original visionary. When push came to shove, the internal workforce sided overwhelmingly with the founder over the boardroom.

3. Future Stability and Board Relations

Though Mullenweg has returned to the helm as Chairman and CEO, the relationship between him and the Board of Directors has undeniably been fractured. Operating with a board that attempted to remove him just days prior—only to be forced into issuing an informal, defensive retraction statement—will require delicate navigation.

For now, the digital dust has settled, WordPress continues to run uninterrupted, and Matt Mullenweg sits once again at his desk at Automattic. However, the September 2026 boardroom drama will long be remembered as a masterclass in how a determined founder can weaponize internal communications and employee solidarity to reverse a corporate execution.