CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss has been accused of dragging her feet in filling a key role at the network’s flailing morning show.
Weiss tapped former CBS Mornings host Tony Dokoupil to helm the network’s newly revamped MAGA-friendly CBS Evening News broadcast starting in January.
Since then, both shows have struggled to attract viewers, with CBS Mornings experiencing its lowest-rated quarter on record.
Despite the historically low viewership at CBS Mornings, Weiss still hasn’t found a replacement for Dokoupil, the New York Post reported. The show is led by Dokoupil’s former co-hosts Gayle King and Nate Burleson.
“The problem is there’s no bench and there’s hardly any frontline talent,” a CBS insider told the Post.
Both shows are struggling in part because after multiple rounds of lay-offs and buyouts, CBS doesn’t have heavy-weight correspondents to back up the network’s anchors during major news events, sources told the paper.
All major editorial and hiring decisions must be approved by Weiss, who, according to insiders, is on her “own timeline” and is less concerned about the quick turnaround of TV news, the Post reported.
Weiss planned to bring on former CBS News anchor Josh Elliott for a trial run to fill Dokoupil’s seat, but that idea fell apart after Elliott’s messy divorce turned into a tabloid scandal.
The Daily Beast has reached out to CBS for comment.
Some of the departing CBS journalists have blasted the network for its new, ideologically driven coverage under Weiss, 42, and David Ellison, the billionaire nepo baby and ally of President Donald Trump, who bought CBS’s parent company last year.
The “anti-woke” Weiss abandoned the network’s standards for news objectivity by celebrating Trump’s war with Iran, and she has repeatedly censored episodes of 60 Minutes that featured reporting the White House opposed.
The network’s rightward turn reportedly helped convince former 60 Minutes star Anderson Cooper to leave CBS after nearly 20 years when his contract expired earlier this year.
Cooper blamed the move on wanting to spend more time with his two small children, but sources told Status he wasn’t comfortable with the direction the show was taking under Weiss, who held up one of Cooper’s segments investigating a White House policy accepting white refugees from South Africa.
Another round of firings is reportedly planned for June, as Weiss aims to further remake 60 Minutes in her image.
In the meantime, Dokoupil, 45, has come under fire for conducting softball interviews with key MAGA figures, including Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth; praising Trump and his Cabinet members; and playing to Trump’s anti-elite base despite his own privileged background.
Dokoupil, who has railed against “elites,” is married to MS Now afternoon anchor Katy Tur, with whom he shares a three-story townhouse in one of Brooklyn’s most exclusive enclaves.
CBS Evening News executive producer Kam Harvey has created a “softer” program that starts off newsy but typically gives way to lighter segments featuring supposed crowd-pleasers, like pets and meteor sightings.
In January, Dokoupil interviewed his mom for a segment about grandparents who care for their grandkids scoring better on memory and language tests.
