\n<\/p>\n
The CBS broadcast 60 Minutes announced a new slate of correspondents and contributors on Tuesday that will help replace a group of longtime correspondents, including Scott Pelley, Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, who were fired this spring.<\/p>\n
The most significant addition to the lineup, announced in a memo to employees from the executive producer, Nick Bilton, is the New York Times opinion columnist Ross Douthat, who is joining as a correspondent. Bilton called Douthat, who is leaving the Times, \u201ca thinker of uncommon rigor and a journalist of deep empathy\u201d.<\/p>\n
The show is also adding three new contributors: the author and documentarian Sebastian Junger, film-maker Gianna Toboni and prominent UK journalist and political commentator Trevor Phillips, who was hired by CBS News as a global correspondent in June.<\/p>\n
Bilton also announced that Norah O\u2019Donnell, a \u201cpowerhouse\u201d former network anchor who has served as a contributor to the show, had been promoted to the role of full-time correspondent.<\/p>\n
\u201cAn exceptional lineup of journalists will be joining 60 Minutes, carrying on its tradition of fearless, independent and impartial reporting. I can\u2019t wait for them to get started,\u201d he wrote in the memo.<\/p>\n
Praising Douthat, Junger, Toboni and Phillips, Bilton wrote that they were \u201centrepreneurial journalists who understand how to reach modern audiences. Between them they have written books and magazine articles, produced documentaries, TV shows and podcasts, hosted live events and built brands on independent platforms.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bilton\u2019s announcement comes two months after the day known by some 60 Minutes staffers as \u201cBlack Thursday\u201d, when the network ousted Vega, Alfonsi, executive producer Tanya Simon, executive editor Draggan Mihailovich and multiple producers. Pelley was fired \u2013 \u201cfor cause\u201d \u2013 the following week after challenging network management in a series of meetings.<\/p>\n
But, the show\u2019s leadership was able to retain the services of longtime correspondents Lesley Stahl, Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim, who decided to \u201cstay and fight\u201d by remaining in their roles.<\/p>\n
While the show\u2019s staff largely takes off the month of July, Bilton said the show had \u201cso many stellar pieces in the works\u201d for the new season, which begins on 13 September.<\/p>\n
Since leaving the network, Pelley, Alfonsi and Vega have all accused CBS News leadership of meddling with the show\u2019s editorial independence, a charge the network has denied.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The CBS broadcast 60 Minutes announced a new slate of correspondents and contributors on Tuesday that will help replace a group of longtime correspondents, including Scott Pelley, Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, who were fired this spring. The most significant addition to the lineup, announced in a memo to employees from the executive producer, Nick<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":51504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[1753,10144,24335,12771,788,205,3279],"class_list":{"0":"post-51503","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-adds","9":"tag-contributors","10":"tag-correspondents","11":"tag-departures","12":"tag-key","13":"tag-media","14":"tag-minutes"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51503","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=51503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/51504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=51503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=51503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=51503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}