Taking charge of CBS News in early October with no television industry experience, and already facing both deep skepticism from many network employees and a faltering business model, Bari Weiss began with a lot working against her.
Still, her three months as editor in chief have been more chaotic than even many of her critics expected. “There is blood in the water,” said one CBS News journalist, who, like the others quoted in this story, was not authorized by the network to comment.
In recent days, a group of former CBS News journalists drafted a letter to David Ellison, the man who bought Weiss’s company, the Free Press, and put her atop the network, expressing deep reservations about her recent decision to pull a segment originally scheduled to air on the 21 December episode of 60 Minutes, creating perhaps the first real crisis of her tenure.
The story, by veteran correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, had been abruptly removed from the show’s lineup after Weiss determined that it had issues that needed to be addressed, including a lack of a response from the Trump administration. Still, the decision shocked those inside and outside the company. The network has said the segment, about abuses at the Cecot prison in El Salvador, will air at a later date, likely this month. (The segment did not air on Sunday’s edition of 60 Minutes, though another piece reported by Alfonsi did.)
“This clumsy editorial interference endangers 60 Minutes’ role as CBS’s flagship public interest broadcast and as the news division’s most profitable franchise,” according to an early draft of the letter, which was originally slated to be sent on Saturday. “The crown jewel of the network you recently acquired now faces a crisis of credibility and trust.”
While
Continue Reading on The Guardian
This preview shows approximately 15% of the article. Read the full story on the publisher's website to support quality journalism.