Discussion of the growing 60 Minutes controversy was conspicuously absent from a CBS editorial meeting on Tuesday morning.
The network’s MAGA-curious new editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss, who personally spiked a segment critical of the Trump administration that was set to air Sunday night, was on the call but did not address the now-viral report that a Canadian affiliate mistakenly aired.
The Washington Post and Vanity Fair reported that Weiss, 41, joined the meeting via Zoom and “waved hi” from her car but did not speak. CNN’s Brian Stelter reported that the 60 Minutes controversy was not mentioned during the meeting.
Weiss’ silence is a stark contrast to Monday’s meeting, when reports say she was “visibly frustrated” as she went to great lengths to justify her decision.
“This is 60 Minutes,” she told staff in that meeting. “We need to be able to make every effort to get the principals on the record and on camera. To me, our viewers come first, not a listing schedule or anything else, and that is my north star, and I hope it’s the north star of every person in this newsroom.”
CBS did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday.
Weiss has been under fire since she pulled the segment, about the inhumane conditions at CECOT, an El Salvadoran prison that the Trump administration flew Venezuelan migrants to without due process, at the eleventh hour on Sunday.
The veteran 60 Minutes correspondent at the center of the segment, Sharyn Alfonsi, slammed the decision as a “political” one. She has been backed by many of her colleagues.
Weiss claimed that politics did not factor in her decision, adding that the segment was simply “not ready” and required additional reporting, like getting a member of the Trump administration on camera.
60 Minutes approached the White House, the State Department, and Homeland Security for comment multiple times since November, Stelter wrote in his Reliable Sources newsletter.
None of the agencies offered an official for an interview, he wrote. Reliable Sources reported that the White House’s response to the report did not address allegations of torture and abuse that were made by two of the men Alfonsi interviewed.
“60 Minutes should spend their time and energy amplifying the stories of Angel Parents, whose innocent American children have tragically been murdered by vicious illegal aliens that President Trump are removing from the country,” White House deputy press secretary Abigail Jackson in a statement to 60 Minutes, according to Reliable Sources.
Alfonsi told her colleagues that the episode was “screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices.” Weiss first watched the segment on Thursday and offered “perfectly standard feedback,” which the 60 Minutes team addressed on Friday, according to CNN.
Things took an abrupt turn over the weekend. Despite CBS already promoting the segment and releasing it to international affiliates, Weiss stepped in to ax the piece with just hours to spare.
Although it did not receive its primetime Sunday evening slot, the 14-minute segment still reached a global audience after the Canadian broadcaster Global TV mistakenly published the episode on its streaming app.
The clip has repeatedly been hit with copyright strikes on YouTube and other social media platforms, but it keeps popping back up on X, BlueSky, and Substack.
