The former managing editor of 60 Minutes has delivered a brutal verdict on the news program’s MAGA makeover.
The once-storied news show marked its 59th season premiere on Sunday with 7.94 million viewers, according to Nielsen ratings, marking the lowest viewership for the newsmagazine’s season opener since at least the turn of the century. The coveted 25-54 demographic also dropped by a third, to 1.6 million viewers.
Guy Campanile, who worked at the network for more than 35 years before newly installed CBS editor-in-chief Bari Weiss fired him, reacted bluntly to the loss.
“I can best sum it up as you are what the scoreboard says you are,” he told Breaker.
Ahead of the premiere, Campanile wrote on Facebook that he and other ousted colleagues Tanya Simon, Draggan Mihailovich, Matthew Polevoy, Scott Pelley, Sharyn Alfonsi, and Cecilia Vega “refused to be accomplices in the destruction of the most prestigious news program on American television.” He also doubled down on claims that Weiss ousted him and other staffers in May because they “would not compromise our principles or reputations by jamming unverifiable notions or White House talking points into our reporting.”
Now, months on, Campanile said it’s clear the show is suffering without former executive producer Tanya Simon, whom Weiss replaced with former tech columnist Nick Bilton. Prior to her departure, Simon had grown viewership by nine percent.
“If they don’t grow 9% by the end of the year, you have failed,” Campanile said. “[Weiss] owns it for better or worse. The viewers will always have the last word in this story.”
On Sunday, the ratings blow came after CBS aired Sunday night football, a strong lead-in for a broadcast program. Faceoffs between the Los Angeles Chargers and Arizona Cardinals, as well as the Minnesota Vikings and Green Bay Packers, aired directly before 60 Minutes. CBS’ Sunday night football broadcasts drew a larger audience than any other program on cable television, according to Yahoo Sports.
But a television executive defended 60 Minutes’ low viewership to the Daily Beast by arguing that CBS’s Sunday NFL coverage drew about 18.4 million viewers, down roughly 22 percent from 23.7 million last year.
Still, viewership appears to be top of mind for Weiss and her team. On Wednesday afternoon, CBS announced that the next installment of 60 Minutes would be centered around an interview with Patrick Clancy, the ex-husband of Lindsay Clancy, whose bombshell trial for the murder of her three young children captivated the nation. It will be the first interview the bereaved parent has sat for since his ex-wife’s trial ended in a mistrial, after the jury was split 11-1 in an acquittal.
