Over the previous few weeks, CBS News boss Bari Weiss has fired many of the top correspondents and producers at her community’s famed “60 Minutes.” One of them subsequently accused her of tilting her coverage to please the Trump administration — which is not the first time a “60 Minutes” worker has stated that.
Weiss, and her stewardship of CBS News, has been an enormous story for media reporters since she took the job final fall. But Weiss’ current selections — together with hiring Nick Bilton, a former New York Times journalist who has by no means labored in TV information — have kicked the narrative into overdrive. Some observers are questioning if Paramount proprietor David Ellison, who installed Weiss at CBS after buying her Free Press startup final fall, could have second ideas.
Meanwhile, Ellison’s Paramount is in the final stages of acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery, which suggests it might be shopping for NCS. And all of that may be a notably compelling story for NCS’s Brian Stelter, who’s each overlaying Paramount and may match for the corporate later this yr.
I requested Stelter to evaluate Weiss’ tenure at CBS, and why the story appears to imply one thing to individuals who by no means watch the community or its information programming. You can hear our whole dialog on my Channels podcast. The following is an edited excerpt of our chat:
Peter Kafka: Bari Weiss and Scott Pelley and “60 Minutes” and CBS News and David Ellison is a large media trade story. Is it a narrative regular individuals care about?
Brian Stelter: It is. It is the uncommon media story that has damaged containment. I see it within the most-read checklist on NCS.com. I see it within the engagement on Instagram. I additionally see it in my inbox, listening to from readers who I nearly by no means hear from.
I feel it is as a result of “60 Minutes” is larger than a single hour on tv. It’s an American establishment. And what we have been overlaying in Trump 2.0 are American establishments underneath strain.
It’s additionally damaged by as a result of it is a boss versus worker or an worker versus boss story. Lots of people have fantasies about talking up and talking fact to energy to the boss. And on one stage, that is what Pelley did.
I feel the broader cause that is breaking by is as a result of there may be nervousness about the place information is coming from. Is information reliable? Are newsrooms underneath strain? What’s happening inside a spot like CBS News?
“60 Minutes” is completed making new exhibits till the autumn. Will it’s a completely reimagined “60 Minutes” then, or will it seem like “60 Minutes” was this yr?
I feel it is going to look principally like “60 Minutes” this yr. Bilton stated to me when he was first employed, “The core of ’60 Minutes’ will remain ’60.'” He stated, “The Sunday show will not change.”
Of course it should, to some extent, as a result of he needs to hire correspondents. And Bari Weiss is happy about that half.
She desires to usher in new expertise, new outdoors voices and power. I feel she most likely desires to make use of some sources from The Free Press. But for probably the most half, it is nonetheless going to be three mini-documentaries each Sunday.
The actual concern is about whether or not the present’s going to go mushy in a roundabout way. But Weiss has stated to her buddies she desires the present to go arduous. She desires hard-hitting investigations, and Bilton has stated he’s green-lighting tales concerning the Trump administration.
Last week, Scott Pelley sat down with The New York Times for a reasonably extraordinary interview. You do not usually see individuals do this after they have been publicly fired. What are your takeaways?
There are moments the place he sounds self-indulgent. There had been moments that I discovered arduous to consider. [Like when] Pelley says he had by no means heard of Bari Weiss till she was employed.
That’s unimaginable to consider. The proven fact that Bari Weiss was going to take over CBS News had been reported for a very long time. Even if that is not the form of factor you’ll usually take note of, you’d wish to learn about your new boss.
It additionally did not make sense to me that he claimed he did not assume he was going to be fired after talking as much as the boss. Everyone was on firing watch, anticipating him to be fired at any second.
But total, he made a very vital level on to Paramount. He stated what a lot of his colleagues nonetheless at CBS really feel. He stated to the management, “This can be fixed.” He stated, “Bari Weiss is a lovely person who has been put in the wrong job. You can still land this plane.”
Pelley additionally stated he has proof of Bari Weiss interfering with the information in a means that’s politically motivated. That’s the second time someone from “60 Minutes” has said that out loud.
In each circumstances, I feel a fair-minded observer may say, “That sounds bad, but also I’m not 100% sure that what he says is political bias is necessarily political bias.”
In Pelley’s case, they did a narrative about federal agents killing Renée Good, and his interpretation is that Bari Weiss needed that piece balanced in a means that benefited the Trump administration.
But I can think about some nuance: “Look, are we covering all the angles? Are we dotting all the i’s? And what we say in an email is not what we put out as a report.”
You’re hitting on this tug-of-war between one aspect saying it is political interference and the opposite aspect saying, “No, this is just how newsrooms work. We’re just having editorial discussions. And there should be a push and pull.” I perceive why it was regarding to him. But I do not know if it provides as much as an actual thumb on the size the way in which he says.
[I’ve asked Weiss for comment. A CBS News rep says Weiss’ proposed changes “had no political motivation and were proposed solely to make the piece as strong, fair, and accurate as possible.”]
There’s now this concept that the “60 Minutes” controversy is perhaps an excessive amount of for Ellison to bear — both as a result of it is embarrassing, or possibly it is an issue with regulators. But he is presumably going to personal Paramount for many years, and if he desires to, he can have a really lengthy view and never fear about what individuals such as you and I are saying within the spring of 2026. Do you assume there’s any cause he says, “Actually, the Bari Weiss experiment is a failure or needs to be changed in some meaningful way?”
I do not know. I urge everyone to return and reread his memo from October when he employed Bari Weiss and purchased The Free Press.
He talked about how polarized the nation is, how destabilized our politics really feel, how the extremes are profitable out, and the way firms like Paramount have a accountability to assist individuals know what’s actual on the planet.
He stated plenty of actually highly effective issues in that memo about restoring belief. Has Weiss restored belief in media? That’s the honest query to ask 9 months later.
In Pelley’s interview, he notes that “60 Minutes” continues to be doing nicely. But Paramount is saying that “60 Minutes” must be blown up — that it is a melting ice dice, in Nick Bilton’s language, and it wants to maneuver to the long run.
A profitable broadcast tv present that pulls hundreds of thousands of viewers isn’t nothing. Do you assume it must be blown up? Or eased into one thing else?
I discover it to be a really persuasive, compelling argument that “60 Minutes” — and I acknowledge that is principally the Weiss camp saying this on background — that “60 Minutes” is basically highly effective, nevertheless it’s outdated. It’s archaic. It’s too insular.
Weiss is clearly decided to make her mark at “60 Minutes” and never enable the historic insularity of “60 Minutes” to proceed.
There are some actually sturdy arguments for why you need to evolve now — from a place of power whereas the present continues to be extremely rated — moderately than anticipate the rankings to erode. The line that Bilton and Weiss used internally was, “If you don’t disrupt yourself, you will get disrupted.”
I feel the historical past of media exhibits that’s true. But it at all times comes right down to, not whether or not to do it, however the way you do it. How do you execute on the plan? Isn’t this the story we cowl again and again? People doing the correct issues, possibly within the improper methods.
But would not this seem like what David Ellison needed when he introduced in Bari Weiss — who has zero tv expertise and is an ideologue — and stated, “I want you to run this news organization, including ’60 Minutes,’ and I want you to blow it up?”
There’s plenty of fact in what you are saying. I’ve perceived from individuals near Weiss that she regarded round CBS News and was shocked by simply how out of date a few of the operations had been again when she arrived.
She regarded round, and she or he stated, “This place has been losing, so I’m not gonna be tethered to what you were doing for 10 or 20 years. It wasn’t working.”
And she had plenty of latitude, and does right now, because of Ellison. But Ellison additionally stated in his announcement the day that she was employed that “We’re going to make CBS News the most trusted name in news.”
We consider the vast majority of the nation longs for information that’s balanced and fact-based, and we would like CBS to be their dwelling.” The issue now is a lot of these actions, a lot of these controversies, they have eroded trust. They have not built trust back.
[Ellison, in a Sunday telephone call to “60” correspondent Lesley Stahl, said he would respect the editorial independence of the program, Stahl told the Times on Tuesday.]
You’re at NCS, reporting on the company that is likely to own NCS later this year. What’s the vibe in the room?
Yeah. I’m covering the Paramount saga from inside the company that Paramount is trying to acquire.
I am very happy to say I have full autonomy to do so. No one is influencing my reporting. No one’s reviewing what I’m saying on TV. I’m really blessed to have that autonomy.
So let’s play this merger out for a moment. Let’s say that Paramount does win all the necessary approvals, and NCS and CBS are owned by the same company. There are a lot of great opportunities. I see a lot of potential. It makes a lot of sense, as both a viewer as well as an employee of NCS.
But nobody knows how it’s going to work. A lot of the news coverage this week has revolved around what that might look like. There were reviews Tuesday morning about Paramount making an attempt to usher in a business-side associate for Bari Weiss.
I feel there are some causes to be skeptical of these tales. But it simply exhibits the quantity of uncertainty that exists proper now about what that post-merger panorama appears to be like like.