Scott Pelley alleges CBS ‘thumb on the scale’ for Trump under Bari Weiss

Bari Weiss has ripped 60 Minutes to shreds—and earned a venomous reputation amongst the show’s various contributors and producers as a result.Change at the investigative weekly program has been rapid and corrosive. Late last month, Weiss simultaneously fired executive producer Tanya Simon, correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi (who criticized Weiss’s decision to delay her report on the notoriously brutal CECOT mega-prison in El Salvador), correspondent Cecilia Vega, and executive editor Draggan Mihailovich. That same day, she appointed Nick Bilton—a former Vanity Fair columnist with no television broadcast experience—to lead the venerated newsmagazine.The following week, Scott Pelley—the de facto face of CBS News—was canned after he openly questioned Bilton’s appointment during a contentious staff meeting.Former staffers of the investigative news program have since sounded off on Weiss’s chaotic takeover and her heavy hand in restructuring the show.“We have to acknowledge that 60 Minutes needed a bit of a facelift, and there were potentially positive ways to improve the program, but it’s the way they have gone about it,” one former staffer told Variety. “You don’t give a facelift with a fucking machete.” Rome Hartman, who worked as a producer on the show for 25 years, lamented the figurative arson of his “professional home,” and speculated that the show would only continue to decay under Weiss and Bilton’s direction.“Scott wasn’t shouting at him or physically intimidating the guy—he was doing exactly what he should’ve done in the best tradition of the best 60 Minutes correspondents,” Hartman told Variety. “And if Nick Bilton is such a snowflake that he can’t possibly tolerate a voice of challenge—and if Bari Weiss has to hide behind his skirts—that does not speak well of how he’s going to run the place or how she’s going to run the place.” But she may not be running the place for much longer at all. CBS’s parent company, Paramount Skydance, is pursuing a merger with Warner Bros. Discovery—a monumental industry shift that could see Weiss’s brief tenure atop the network come to an end, according to 30-year 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft.“I have a feeling that Bari will not be overseeing 60 Minutes for very much longer. I think once the deal gets done with Warner Bros., people will demand that she be let go or move into another position,” Kroft told Variety. “Everything she’s touched has turned to shit. Everything she’s touched has gone colossally wrong. And I don’t think she’s showed any talent for this position. She’s only fulfilling other people’s agendas.”

Robby Soave and Amber Duke discuss the recent drama between Scott Pelley and Bari Weiss at CBS.

After Scott Pelley was fired from "60 Minutes," he says of CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss: "Television's not her thing. She doesn't know television. She doesn't understand how it works. She doesn't have management experience for a large organization like CBS News."

CBS News correspondent Scott Pelley is going after Bari Weiss after his firing from “60 Minutes,” lashing out during an interview with The New York Times in which he asserted that Weiss has no television experience and should not have her current job.  

Scott Pelley’s bombshell interview with The New York Times over the weekend after his firing from “60 Minutes” has drawn even more scrutiny to the management style of Bari Weiss, who in October was installed to oversee CBS News. The former print journalist, who launched the “Free Press” website, had no TV experience when Paramount […]

Scott Pelley, the longtime “60 Minutes” correspondent who was fired by the network last week after criticizing its new leadership, is sparking scorn from conservatives over a new interview with the New York Times.   During the wide-ranging interview, Pelley fought back tears as he described being fired by top bosses at CBS News, accused its corporate leadership of altering coverage...