A newsroom firestorm has erupted at CBS News after editor-in-chief Bari Weiss made the eleventh‑hour call on Sunday to shelve a 60 Minutes report that was critical of President Donald Trump.
60 Minutes staff aired their grievances at a staff meeting on Monday, voicing frustration with Weiss’s leadership and her handling of the segment, which detailed the grisly conditions at an El Salvador megaprison where Venezuelan men deported by the Trump administration were held.
“It’s not a part-time job,” longtime correspondent Scott Pelley said, blasting Weiss for missing screenings of the segment, according to The New York Times’ Michael M. Grynbaum.
Weiss, 41, screened the segment for the first time last Thursday and initially approved it, sources told CNN. In total, the story was reportedly screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and the Standards and Practices department.
But on Saturday, the day before the segment was set to air, Weiss reportedly messaged 60 Minutes executive producer Tanya Simon with a list of concerns.
Simon told colleagues on Monday that she had “defended” the segment but was ultimately forced to “comply” with Weiss’s demands for additional reporting, including an interview with a member of the Trump administration.
“In the end, our editor-in-chief had a different vision for how the piece should be, and it came late in the process, and we were not in a position to address the notes,” Simon said, according to The Washington Post, which obtained a partial transcript of the meeting.
The longtime 60 Minutes producer added: “We pushed back, we defended our story, but she wanted changes, and I ultimately had to comply.”
Simon reportedly said she stands “100 percent” behind the segment and Sharyn Alfonsi, the veteran 60 Minutes correspondent who reported the story.
Alfonsi, 53, called Weiss’s shelving of the story a “political” decision in a leaked memo to 60 Minutes staff.
At a Monday morning editorial call, Weiss called on the newsroom to handle “contentious disagreements” with “respect” in an apparent rebuke of Alfonsi’s memo.
Alfonsi hit back during the 60 Minutes staff meeting, noting Weiss never contacted her directly about the segment and saying, “Disagreement requires discussion,” according to Grynbaum.
In her memo, Alfonsi said that she had asked Weiss for a call to discuss her decision to “spike” the story, but that Weiss “did not afford us that courtesy/opportunity.”
She noted that requests for comment on the piece had been sent to the Department of Homeland Security, the White House, and the State Department.
“If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient,” Alfonsi wrote.
Weiss, the founder of the conservative The Free Press, said in the editorial call that she “held that story because it wasn’t ready” and “did not advance the ball,” according to CNN media analyst Brian Stelter.
“And this is 60 Minutes. We need to be able to get the principals on the record and on camera‚” said Weiss, who Trump-friendly Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison appointed as CBS News’ editor-in-chief in October.
But sources inside CBS News say Weiss’s decision was driven by mounting pressure tied to Trump himself.
Weiss raised her concerns with the report just hours after Trump, 79, attacked CBS and 60 Minutes during a rally in North Carolina on Friday.
”I love the new owners of CBS,” Trump said, referring to Ellison, who rose to power after the FCC greenlit the $8 billion merger between Paramount and Skydance Media in July. “Something happens to them, though. 60 Minutes has treated me worse under the new ownership… they just keep hitting me, it’s crazy.”
Weiss told The New York Times in a statement on Sunday, “My job is to make sure that all stories we publish are the best they can be. Holding stories that aren’t ready for whatever reason—that they lack sufficient context, say, or that they are missing critical voices—happens every day in every newsroom. I look forward to airing this important piece when it’s ready.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to CBS for comment.
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