CBS Chief Pulls 60 Minutes Segment on Deportations

CBS News' new boss has yanked a 60 Minutes investigation off the air at the last minute, and the show's own correspondent is calling it a political move. Editor-in-chief Bari Weiss pulled a segment examining alleged mistreatment of Venezuelan migrants held at a high-security prison in El Salvador just a day and a half before Sunday's broadcast, NPR reports. Weiss told staff the piece couldn't run without an on-the-record response from the Trump administration. The decision came after the story had already been cleared by senior producers, news executives, and the network's legal and standards teams, according to two people familiar with the reviews.

Two competing views:

• Reporter: "If the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a 'kill switch' for any reporting they find inconvenient," Sharyn Alfonsi wrote in an internal note to CBS colleagues, per the Washington Post. "In my view, pulling it now, after every rigorous internal check has been met, is not an editorial decision, it is a political one." Alfonsi called the story "factually correct," adding that she repeatedly sought comments from the White House.
• Weiss: "My job is to make sure that all stories we publish are the best they can be," she said in a statement, per the New York Times. "Holding stories that aren't ready for whatever reason—that they lack sufficient context, say, or that they are missing critical voices—happens every day in every newsroom. I look forward to airing this important piece when it's ready." Among other things, Weiss had objected to describing men in the story as "Venezuelan migrants" instead of "illegal immigrants," a term favored by the Trump administration, even though many had pending asylum claims.

The clash lands as CBS undergoes a political and corporate realignment. Weiss, a vocal critic of what she sees as liberal bias in mainstream outlets and founder of the Free Press, was installed as news chief this year after David Ellison's Skydance took over CBS parent Paramount. Ellison assured regulators the network would be more welcoming to conservatives. His father, Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison, is a Trump ally and donor. The network recently paid Trump $16 million to settle a lawsuit over a prior 60 Minutes segment.