CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss has selected Norah O’Donnell, the 60 Minutes contributing correspondent, to host CBS Mornings for three days next week.
Sources told The New York Post that Weiss and other executives asked O’Donnell, who is also a CBS News senior correspondent, to lead CBS Mornings next Monday through Wednesday while she is in New York for her book tour. O’Donnell will be delving into We the Women: The Hidden Heroes Who Shaped America during those broadcasts and on CBS Sunday Morning, according to a CBS press release.
It won’t be an unfamiliar position for O’Donnell, since she previously co-anchored the network’s morning show from 2012 to 2019, when it was called CBS This Morning. Then, she was paired with Gayle King and Charlie Rose. While Rose is no longer with CBS after sexual harassment allegations arose, King still is. She is joined by Nate Burleson.
A source close to CBS told the Post that O’Donnell is just part of a rotating cast of fill-in hosts until the network decides on a permanent one.
But another differed, adding that Weiss has commented on the good ratings that O’Donnell and King had years ago, implying that something more could be in the works.
The Daily Beast has reached out to representatives for CBS News and Weiss for comment.
After moving on from her morning show hosting duties, O’Donnell, 52, anchored CBS’s nightly newscast until last January.
O’Donnell commented Tuesday on the “challenging” environment at CBS amid the leadership changes there.
“I have worked at CBS now for, oh my goodness, probably almost 14 years, and have had a great career, whether it was covering the White House, anchoring the morning show, anchoring the evening news, working for 60 Minutes‚" she told The Jamie Kern Lima Show.
“We have had a lot of leadership changes at CBS. That has been challenging, not only for me, but I know for my colleagues. And I think with so many leadership changes, people are fearful about what the future means.”
Since 2013, O’Donnell has been a contributing correspondent for 60 Minutes. Next season, that program will be without Anderson Cooper, who reportedly was at odds with the “rightward direction” of the network under the leadership of anti-woke opinion writer Weiss and Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison.
“At least one other correspondent” will also be leaving, CNN reported.
