(CNN) — Scott Pelley says “CBS News is on fire” and the news division’s editor in chief Bari Weiss should be removed from her job.
“My hope is that the leadership of Paramount will say to themselves, this isn’t working,” Pelley said in an interview with The New York Times, his first since being fired by CBS on June 2.
Pelley said he perceived that Weiss was “putting a thumb on the scale” on behalf of the Trump administration during the most recent season of “60 Minutes.”
A CBS News spokesperson said Pelley’s argument is not credible and that there is no political interference at the news organization.
The bigger problem, Pelley told The Times, was “not any kind of political influence. The problem was the incompetence.”
The interview, published Sunday morning, affirms that Pelley is not going quietly after the controversial housecleaning at “60 Minutes,” the most watched news program on American television.
A spokesperson for Weiss declined CNN’s request for comment about the Pelley interview.
The housecleaning at ‘60 Minutes’
At the end of May, Weiss forced out executive producer Tanya Simon; several other top producers; and two correspondents, Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi.
Simon, who has not spoken publicly about the shakeup, “was completely blindsided by this,” Pelley said.
But a Weiss-led renovation of the program had been rumored for months. Weiss, according to people close to her, concluded that the current “60 Minutes” team was resisting necessary change and failing to evolve in the streaming age.
On the same day as the firings, Weiss installed an outsider, former tech reporter Nick Bilton, to run the show, further roiling the staff that Pelley described as “heartbroken.”
The CBS newsmagazine is famously insular and protective of its culture, and veterans of the program say that’s precisely because its independence and integrity deserve protecting.
But people close to Weiss have argued that the show needs outside energy and thinking. One of the sources said her efforts are about ensuring “that ’60 Minutes’ — and its DNA of hard-hitting interviews, probing investigations, deep journalism — is built to survive a changing media landscape.”
The clash between Weiss and the “60 Minutes” staff has been fueled by mutual distrust and clouded by political drama.
CBS parent company Paramount has sought a close relationship with President Donald Trump while seeking the Trump administration’s approval to buy Warner Bros. Discovery, which includes CNN. Some “60 Minutes” veterans have charged that CBS is trying to soften “60 Minutes” to appease Trump, a charge that network spokespeople have rejected.
Pelley is now voicing those concerns, too, saying “there’s a subtle political bias” being pushed by management.
During a heated staff meeting last Monday, Pelley described Weiss as “unqualified” and challenged Bilton’s competency, as well.
Pelley was terminated the next day, with Bilton justifying the firing by saying Pelley’s “performative display of hostility” showed “you have no interest in contributing to the future success of the show, or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress.”
Pelley told The Times he confronted Bilton because “somebody had to stand up not just for the broadcast but for the people.”
Many “60 Minutes” veterans have touted the program’s high ratings to question why Weiss would try to fix something that’s not broken. Pelley called the past season’s 9% ratings growth “unheard-of in broadcast television.”
In fact, the ratings for CBS telecasts of NFL regular season football games were up 11%, giving “60 Minutes” a big boost for much of the season.
Pelley also challenged the argument that “60 Minutes” has not evolved with the times.
“We started our first ’60 Minutes’ online show, ‘60 Minutes Overtime,’ in 2010,” he said. “I shoot TikTok verticals, or I used to shoot TikTok verticals on every assignment. We’re there. We’re everywhere.”
Weiss has shown little interest in the newsmagazine’s history of experimentation. Her management team, largely comprised of CBS outsiders, has expressed surprise at how outdated some aspects of the news operation have seemed. They have agitated for change — and the current controversy is a result of that.
Pelley told Times interviewer Lulu Garcia-Navarro, who is also a CNN contributor, that Weiss is “a lovely person. And her Free Press organization that she founded has been very successful. But television’s not her thing. This is like somebody walking up to me and saying, ‘There’s a 747, there are 400 people on it, we need you to fly it to Paris.’ I’m going to decline because I don’t have a clue.”
Pelley’s interference claim
Garcia-Navarro asked Pelley to elaborate on his recent charge that management “instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story” and that he ignored the instruction.
The story, he said, was a February 1 report titled “Calls grow for independent probe into Minneapolis shootings.”
Pelley said he had worked hard to present a balanced portrait of the ICE crackdown in Minneapolis, where two protesters were fatally shot by federal officers.
He said that Weiss sent notes to Simon “about four hours after our deadline” that urged changes that were aligned with Trump’s portrayal of the shootings.
Pelley said it felt like “a level of political influence that I had never seen in 37 years at CBS News.”
A CBS News spokesperson said the feedback Weiss sent to Simon “had no political motivation and were proposed solely to make the piece as strong, fair, and accurate as possible.”
Pelley expressed concern both about the feedback and about its timing, coming just a few hours before airtime, which mirrors Alfonsi’s complaint about Weiss intervening in the airing of her “Inside CECOT” report last winter.
People close to Weiss have said comments like Pelley’s show a stubborn, insubordinate streak that wouldn’t be tolerated in any work environment.
But Pelley’s interview indicates that he will continue to defend the newsmagazine’s unique traits in public, seeing this as part of a bigger battle over the future of CBS News.
And Pelley continues to receive widespread support. After reading the interview, former “60 Minutes” correspondent Armen Keteyian wrote on X, “Incredible. Scott spoke for everyone in the family, past and present. Every last word.”
The-CNN-Wire
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