CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss said she controversially pulled a 60 Minutes story on the CECOT prison in El Salvador because it “did not advance the ball.”
Staff at 60 Minutes had protested the story’s nixing, slamming Weiss for what they viewed as a “political” decision not to air the story.
But Weiss later told staff the story “was not ready” in a Monday morning meeting, citing that the “principals” needed to be on record in the story.
“I held a 60 Minutes story because it was not ready,” she reportedly told staff. “While the story presented powerful testimony of torture at CECOT, it did not advance the ball; the [New York] Times and other outlets have previously done similar work. The public knows that Venezuelans have been subjected to horrific treatment at this prison. To run a story on this subject two months later, we need to do more. And this is 60 Minutes. We need to be able to get the principals on the record and on camera.”
“Our viewers come first. Not the listing schedule or anything else. That’s my north star, and I hope it’s yours, too,” Weiss added.
In a separate email to staff on Sunday, Weiss outlined several changes the article needed, among them the inclusion of comments from Trump administration officials.
“At present, we do not present the administration’s argument for why it sent 252 Venezuelans to CECOT. What we have is Karoline Leavitt’s soundbite claiming they are evildoers in America,” she wrote. “But isn’t there much more to ask in light of the torture that we are revealing?”
She added that immigration leaders in the Trump administration, Tom Homan and Stephen Miller, “don’t tend to be shy” and that staff needed to “push harder” to get them on the record.
Weiss also noted that while the segment explains that “nearly half” of the 252 Venezuelans sent to CECOT have no criminal histories, “more than half do have criminal histories,” and staff should’ve explained that.
The administration said the nearly 300 men deported to El Salvador in March were members of the Tren de Aragua gang. Some of the men’s families and their attorneys have denied they are members of the gang, while dozens of the men hadn’t violated immigration laws either.
President Donald Trump invoked the wartime Alien Enemies Act to deport the men. The law allows the administration to deport certain nationals in times of war.
Vice President JD Vance suggested at the time that the plane loads of Venezuelans were “violent criminals and rapists.”
“There were violent criminals and rapists in our country. Democrats fought to keep them here. President Trump deported them,” he said.
The CBS News segment reiterates the reported horrific conditions at the jail, as had been reported in the New York Times. Many of the men described a torturous environment in the prison.
But Weiss believed the segment didn’t include enough of the administration’s input, though staff said the DHS had not responded. The correspondent who reported the story, Sharyn Alfonsi, said the administration’s failure to respond was a “tactical maneuver” designed to “kill” the story.
60 MINUTES CORRESPONDENT RIPS ‘POLITICAL’ DECISION TO PULL SEGMENT ON TRUMP DEPORTATIONS
The Trump administration reflected Weiss’s feelings that the story wasn’t ready.
“The story wasn’t worthy of air. It was biased. Workers aren’t whistleblowers when they refuse to cooperate with standards and policies. Your anonymous Federal employment antics are troubling, too. You are a total coward,” Trump special envoy Richard Grenell posted on X.
