CBS’s new controversial editor-in-chief Bari Weiss pulled a 60 Minutes story that was set to air last night about the torture and other horrid conditions at CECOT, the El Salvador megaprison to which the Trump administration has send hundreds of deportees over the last year..
Weiss’s reason for spiking the piece — that Trump administration officials refused to comment on it — raises questions about how CBS will be covering high profile stories going forward, particularly ones related to controversial U.S. national security policies like war with Venezuela, and the Trump administration’s relationship with Israel.
Indeed, the segment’s lead reporter, Sharyn Alfonsi called the decision to delay the story “political” and observed that administration officials now have a de facto veto over what CBS News will publish. “If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient,” she said.
On Monday, Weiss confirmed that in order for the story to air, she wants Trump administration officials on the record.
“I held a 60 Minutes story because it was not ready. While the story presented powerful testimony of torture at CECOT, it did not advance the ball—the Times and other outlets have previously done similar work,” she reportedly said on a call with the network’s reporters. “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.”
So Alfonsi is correct. If administration officials can effectively kill a story by simply refusing to talk about it on record, that’s basically allowing the government to censor your news coverage. Indeed, one of the major concerns about Weiss taking over at CBS has been that she will serve as a gate-keeper against any perceived anti-Israel reporting. So far Weiss has been making moves — like promoting pro-Israel on air personality Tony Dokoupil as CBS Evening News anchor — that confirm those fears.
But with this latest incident, Bari Weiss is further validating the concern that CBS News, and especially 60 Minutes, will become just another mouthpiece for American power even more than it already is. This has even bigger ramifications, as CBS is the news anchor in a growing media empire run by the pro-Israel Ellison family, which controls a dizzying array of film and television properties under Paramount Skydance, plus technology giant Oracle, and most recently, a big stake in TikTok.
Top photo credit: Ngô Đình Diệm after being shot and killed in the 1963 coup (US National Archives) 
