Fired “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley says CBS Information’ prime editor, Bari Weiss, is directing protection to be extra aligned with the Trump administration’s views.
Throughout an look on The New York Occasions podcast, “The Interview,” Pelley elaborated on his June 2 assertion, during which he stated CBS Information’ new administration had instructed him to “inject falsehoods and bias right into a politically delicate story.”
“There was a thumb on the dimensions for the president’s model of occasions that I felt was a stage of political affect that I had by no means seen in 37 years at CBS Information,” Pelley informed “The Interview.”
Pelley stated his “60 Minutes” workforce had produced a narrative in February detailing ICE operations in Minnesota, throughout which brokers shot and killed Renee Good, and the following anti-ICE protests.
Pelley stated Weiss despatched an e mail to his former boss, Tanya Simon, asking if they might make adjustments to the section.
“Two of the issues within the e mail embody: Can we make the protesters look extra violent?” Pelley stated. “Now, I am paraphrasing. I haven’t got the quote, however that is what was communicated to me. And the opposite factor was Renée Good’s automotive. You must describe her as driving towards the officer.”
Pelley stated the second request contradicted video proof.
“I went over the video of the Renée Good killing over and again and again. Cease movement. Sluggish movement. And realized the occasion was not because the president stated and never the best way Bari Weiss remembered it,” he stated.
Pelley stated Weiss may have been attempting to offer the Trump administration a good shake, however in the end, believed the requests have been motivated by a political agenda.
“She may have been attempting to be truthful to the administration, besides I felt that the story was abundantly truthful to the administration and to the ICE officers and to the Border Patrol officers who have been caught in that second,” Pelley stated. “We have been being informed to write down a model of occasions that conflicted with the video account.”
A spokesperson for CBS Information stated in an announcement that Weiss’ request had “no political motivation.”
“In an e mail, Bari made 4 factors in the midst of editorial back-and-forth. They’d no political motivation and have been proposed solely to make the piece as sturdy, truthful, and correct as potential. As is incessantly the case in any newsroom that operates with collaboration, not every little thing she raised made it into the ultimate piece,” the spokesperson stated.
CBS Information fires Pelley
Pelley’s feedback come after CBS Information fired him final week following a clash with Nick Bilton, the brand new “60 Minutes” government producer Weiss appointed, and demanding feedback he made about Weiss.
Weiss told CBS News staffers that administration tried to interact with Pelley and “discover a approach again,” however “sadly, we weren’t in a position to take action, and so we needed to half methods. We didn’t need that to occur, however that is the trail that he selected.”
Pelley, in an announcement on the time, stated Weiss “is aware of what she stated shouldn’t be true.”
Clashes with a brand new editor
The conflict between Pelley and CBS Information’ prime brass started after its dad or mum firm — Paramount Skydance — acquired Weiss’ anti-establishment information website, The Free Press, in October 2025.
As a part of the deal, Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison appointed Weiss editor in chief of CBS’s newsroom. Her lack of tv expertise and a perceived political bias involved some staffers.
Weiss started shaking up CBS Information within the months that adopted, together with pulling a December section in regards to the Trump administration’s use of El Salvador’s CECOT prison from the air and telling staffers in January that layoffs weren’t off the table.
“60 Minutes” has undergone a major overhaul. Longtime correspondent Anderson Cooper left the present in Could, whereas CBS Information fired Pelley, correspondent Cecilia Vega, government producer Tanya Simon, and government editor Draggan Mihailovich.
CBS Information additionally did not renew its contract with Sharyn Alfonsi, the correspondent who lined the Trump administration’s use of the Salvadoran jail.
The Paramount settlement
Though the fallout at “60 Minutes” has dominated latest headlines, the drama started lengthy earlier than.
President Donald Trump filed a lawsuit towards Paramount — CBS Information’ dad or mum firm — in 2024, saying the outlet used “misleading enhancing” in a “60 Minutes” interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. Paramount initially fought the lawsuit however settled with Trump for $16 million in July 2025.
Ellison’s firm, Skydance Media, merged with Paramount the next month.
In his interview on Sunday, Pelley described that settlement as a “bribe.”
“That lawsuit towards 60 Minutes had precipitated an excessive amount of concern in ’60 Minutes.’ Paying the bribe broke our hearts,” he stated. “No lawyer thought that was mandatory.”
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