\n<\/p>\n
T<\/span>aking 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.<\/p>\n Still, her three months as editor in chief have been more chaotic than even many of her critics expected. \u201cThere is blood in the water,\u201d said one CBS News journalist, who, like the others quoted in this story, was not authorized by the network to comment.<\/p>\n In recent days, a group of former CBS News journalists drafted a letter to David Ellison, the man who bought Weiss\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n The story, by veteran correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, had been abruptly removed from the show\u2019s 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\u2019s edition of 60 Minutes, though another piece reported by Alfonsi did.)<\/p>\n \u201cThis clumsy editorial interference endangers 60 Minutes\u2019 role as CBS\u2019s flagship public interest broadcast and as the news division\u2019s most profitable franchise,\u201d according to an early draft of the letter, which was originally slated to be sent on Saturday. \u201cThe crown jewel of the network you recently acquired now faces a crisis of credibility and trust.\u201d<\/p>\n While the letter received nearly 200 signatories, including many veteran journalists as well as prominent individuals in the entertainment industry, the organizers have shelved it for now \u2013 \u201cgiving the staff at CBS News an opportunity to continue doing the good work they do\u201d.<\/p>\n One signatory listed was former 60 Minutes producer Lowell Bergman, who was blocked by the network from publishing an exclusive interview with a tobacco industry whistleblower in the mid-1990s. That incident was cited in an email Alfonsi sent to colleagues protesting Weiss\u2019s decision to pull the piece as \u201cpolitical\u201d.<\/p>\n Alfonsi\u2019s email was a rare rebuke of company management that could be seen by some as insubordination. It also served as the first open airing of grievances that many network staffers have expressed anonymously for weeks and months about Weiss. (Alfonsi did not respond to an email seeking comment.)<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve known and worked with Sharyn Alfonsi for nearly 20 years, and I trust and support her completely,\u201d Rome Hartman, a former 60 Minutes producer who left the network last year, said in an interview. \u201cI don\u2019t know Bari Weiss at all, and I don\u2019t pretend to know why she did what she did with this piece. Sharyn\u2019s explanation to her colleagues of what happened is clear and compelling. I can\u2019t say the same about Weiss\u2019s explanations so far.\u201d<\/p>\n Hartman said he doubts the open letter to Ellison will help, considering that Weiss seems to be accomplishing the mission he gave her.<\/p>\n While Weiss successfully pulled Alfonsi\u2019s segment, it was too late for the Canadian television network Global TV, which aired it, providing an easy basis for comparison if and when the segment airs on CBS.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyone with network TV experience could have warned her that holding that story would have been like walking the plank,\u201d a former CBS News reporter said. \u201cOnce you promote it, there are very limited circumstances under which you hold it, including it being false. That wasn\u2019t the case. But I think it\u2019s also true that it wasn\u2019t moving the story forward and it could have included the administration\u2019s perspective. So I think there was blame to go around.\u201d<\/p>\n We are a prideful newsroom, and she\u2019s rubbing people the wrong wayA CBS News staffer<\/p>\n In addition to a chorus of criticism from liberals, Weiss has faced blowback from stars of the conservative media world who are normally aligned with her anti-woke, anti-cancel culture political alignment. One of Weiss\u2019s first big moves was a 13 December town hall with Erika Kirk, the widow of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, that failed to attract major advertisers and performed weakly with viewers.<\/p>\n \u201cBari Weiss wants to couch herself as Erika\u2019s protector, Erika\u2019s defender,\u201d Megyn Kelly said at an event held recently by Kirk\u2019s organization Turning Point USA. \u201cBari doesn\u2019t know anything about Erika. Bari Weiss has never been to a Turning Point event.\u201d<\/p>\n During the town hall, Kelly said: \u201cBari Weiss tried to play both super-important VIP executive and super-fabulous star anchor at her new network, CBS.\u201d<\/p>\n Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has also spoken dismissively about Weiss. \u201cI\u2019m not too worried about Bari Weiss taking over the world,\u201d he said on a recent episode of his streaming show, criticizing her support for Israel. \u201cI don\u2019t care how many billionaires hand her news organizations because she\u2019s obedient to their preferred country. She\u2019s still an idiot \u2013 sorry.\u201d (He said, however, that she\u2019s \u201cvery charming and very energetic\u201d.)<\/p>\n Journalists at CBS News say that Weiss still has not laid out a clear strategy for how she wants the network to change and adapt, though she is expected to do so as soon as this week, sources say.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m constantly confused by what her definition of \u2018making news\u2019 is,\u201d a second current CBS News staffer said. \u201cIt seems like she only cares about big names saying controversial things. That\u2019s not the same as newsworthiness.\u201d<\/p>\n In recent weeks, she has infrequently joined the network\u2019s daily editorial calls \u2013 though she spoke up on 22 December to address the 60 Minutes controversy and seemed to criticize some of her employees. \u201cThe only newsroom I\u2019m interested in running is one in which we are able to have contentious disagreements about the thorniest editorial matters with respect and, crucially, where we assume the best intent of our colleagues,\u201d she said, according to an audio recording of her remarks. \u201cAnything else is absolutely unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n Other than that, \u201cwe don\u2019t hear from her very often\u201d, the CBS News staffer said.<\/p>\n Some see that as a good thing, however. \u201cWe are a prideful newsroom, and she\u2019s rubbing people the wrong way,\u201d a third network staffer said.<\/p>\n With Weiss in charge, there have also been internal cultural clashes on issues that align with her worldview, including a previously unreported 6 November blow-up among staffers about language choices when writing about transgender individuals. A prominent correspondent at the network wrote in an email viewed by the Guardian that CBS \u201cshould refrain from adopting terminology advocated by the movement\u201d, referring to guidance from the Trans Journalists Association\u2019s stylebook about how to use the phrase \u201cbiological sex\u201d. A producer responded angrily to the correspondent, writing: \u201cIt\u2019s a TJA style \u2018guide\u2019 \u2013 that\u2019s what I\u2019m trying to do. Guide us to better coverage.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite negative headlines about her tenure, it\u2019s still extremely early in Weiss\u2019s career at the network and she will surely have a long runway to prove out her vision \u2013 whatever she determines that to be.<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s trying to affect a deep cultural change at that network, and that is probably one of the toughest challenges in media,\u201d said Catherine Herridge, a former CBS News investigative journalist. \u201cI still think that if anyone can do it, she probably can. She\u2019s very tough, she\u2019s very smart, and this is monumental what she\u2019s trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n The network\u2019s journalists have also churned out scoops in recent days, despite the distractions. CBS News was first to report early on Saturday that the Trump administration was responsible for the explosions that were reported in Venezuela.<\/p>\n Weiss will have another opportunity for a programming win on Monday, when her revamped evening news show, anchored by Weiss favorite Tony Dokoupil, will officially launch \u2013 though the first CBS News staffer said the run-up to the launch has been \u201cchaotic\u201d. (Weiss had attempted to recruit star anchors from rival networks, including Fox heavyweights Bret Baier and Dana Perino, but discovered they were locked into long-term contracts.)<\/p>\n <\/span>Tony Dokoupil will anchor CBS\u2019s revamped evening news show.<\/span> Photograph: Julio Cortez\/AP<\/p>\n As a promotion for the debut, CBS News sent Dokoupil to New York\u2019s Grand Central Station, where he found few travelers who could pronounce his last name \u2013 or who seemed to know who he was.<\/p>\n Dokoupil was set to begin the show with a 10-city, 10-day tour across the country, but due to the US military action in Venezuela he anchored a special edition of the show on Saturday night and will anchor from New York City on Monday \u2013 instead of Miami. The episode featured a lengthy interview with secretary of defense Pete Hegseth that was booked by Weiss. The cross-country tour, which had raised cost concerns among staffers at a time when they are bracing for further corporate layoffs, will resume later this week, according to the network. (Weiss was expected to join Dokoupil on some of the stops.)<\/p>\n While CBS News declined to make Dokoupil available for an interview, he published a message to viewers criticizing \u201clegacy\u201d media for excessively relying on academics, \u201celites\u201d and \u201cadvocates\u201d \u2013 \u201cand not the average American\u201d. Larry Sabato, an elections expert at the University of Virginia, mockingly replied in a post on X: \u201cAbsolutely! You wouldn\u2019t want \u2018academics and elites\u2019 who have actually studied a subject to outweigh the off-the-cuff opinions of village idiots.\u201d<\/p>\n Responding to skeptical messages on social media, Dokoupil told one critic who unfavorably compared the network\u2019s current iteration with the days of legendary CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite: \u201cI can promise you we\u2019ll be more accountable and more transparent than Cronkite or anyone else of his era.\u201d<\/p>\n Undeterred by the lackluster response to the Erika Kirk town hall, the network recently announced an event series called Things That Matter, which will include town halls featuring the vice-president, JD Vance, and the Maryland governor, Wes Moore, though it\u2019s unclear whether Weiss will be among the CBS News personalities who moderate them. There will also be debates on issues like gender and religion, all sponsored by Bank of America.<\/p>\n Despite the protests of some employees and a lot of racket on social media platforms such as Bluesky, ultimately the only person who matters is Ellison, who has shown no disillusionment with Weiss\u2019s performance.<\/p>\n If anything, she might even double the size of her role in the near future if Ellison is successful at acquiring the assets of Warner Bros Discovery, including CNN, a prospect that has worried some staffers at the cable network.<\/p>\n The irony of the 60 Minutes dust-up is that Weiss and her bosses had recently received something of an endorsement from one of the show\u2019s veteran correspondents. When accepting an award in Washington DC on 12 December, Scott Pelley acknowledged it\u2019s \u201cearly\u201d but said: \u201cWhat I can tell you is we are doing the same kinds of stories with the same kind of rigor, and we have experienced no corporate interference of any kind.\u201d Some on social media chimed in at the time that Pelley might be speaking too soon.<\/p>\n While some have suggested that CBS News journalists who oppose Weiss\u2019s tenure might head for the exits, that seems unlikely, particularly at a time when television jobs are hard to come by. \u201cI know the mood is to stay and fight,\u201d the first CBS News staffer said, with some hoping they may be able to outlast Weiss\u2019s tenure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40460,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[5310,1453,4699,10696,7589,855,150,1183,5311],"class_list":{"0":"post-40459","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-bari","9":"tag-blood","10":"tag-cbs","11":"tag-chaotic","12":"tag-charge","13":"tag-months","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-water","16":"tag-weisss"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40459\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}