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CBS News made a significant decision on Tuesday night, dismissing seasoned “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley. This move came just a day after Pelley openly criticized editor-in-chief Bari Weiss and challenged her newly appointed leadership team. The confrontation highlighted the growing tensions within the storied news program.
The New York Post obtained a letter in which “60 Minutes” executive producer Nick Bilton informed Pelley of his termination, citing it as “for cause effective immediately.” Bilton, who was recently appointed, did not mince words in his communication.
“You commandeered my inaugural meeting with the staff to undermine me, question my qualifications, and cast doubt on my intentions with striking incivility and disdain,” Bilton wrote, referencing the intense exchange that occurred on Monday between Pelley and himself.
Bilton further accused Pelley of orchestrating a “performative display of hostility” and asserted that Pelley showed no intention of contributing to the program’s future success or engaging with Bilton’s leadership with an open mind towards collaboration and progress.
“My goal is to deliver top-tier news content, not to generate headlines about internal conflicts,” Bilton concluded, emphasizing his commitment to the show’s journalistic mission over internal disputes.
Bilton went on to tell Pelley: “Your antipathy to the future of the show has come through loud and clear. And I have heard you.”
At the meeting in question, Pelley told Bilton him he had “slender” qualifications for the job and that he would “never be welcome here,” sources previously told The Post.
Bilton fired back: “You are not going to intimidate me in front of this group of people.”
The correspondent also accused Weiss of “murdering ‘60 Minutes’” and claimed she “was brought in to kill it and is doing exactly that,” according to sources familiar with the exchange.
The clash lasted roughly 15 minutes before Bilton ended the meeting and walked out.
Pelley, a fixture at CBS News for nearly four decades and one of the most recognizable faces on “60 Minutes,” had become one of the most vocal internal critic of Weiss’s efforts to remake CBS News and modernize “60 Minutes” under new owner David Ellison.
In recent weeks, she has overseen a sweeping shakeup at the network that has claimed executive producer Tanya Simon, correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, senior executive producer Draggan Mihailovich, veteran producer Guy Campanile and digital chief Matthew Polvoy.
One CBS insider previously described the purge as “not surgical” but rather “a bloodbath.”
Pelley reportedly referred to the mass dismissals as “Black Thursday.”
The tensions stem in part from Weiss’s intervention in a controversial “60 Minutes” report on El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. Correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi later accused Weiss of attempting to “sanitize accurate reporting,” while Weiss argued the segment required additional reporting and more input from Trump administration officials before it aired.
The report ultimately ran unedited with additional comments from the administration.
Pelley joined CBS News in 1989 and has served as a “60 Minutes” correspondent since 2004. He also anchored the “CBS Evening News” from 2011 through 2017 and has been one of the network’s most prominent on-air personalities.
CBS News declined comment.