Bari Weiss Tells ‘60 Minutes’ Staff She Pulled Deportation Story Because It ‘Did Not Advance the Ball’

Following the news “60 Minutes” pulled a segment about Venezuelans being deported by the Trump administration, Bari Weiss addressed the CBS News staff on Monday. The editor-in-chief called the story “not ready” and said that it failed to “advance the ball,” TheWrap learned from a person who attended the meeting.

“I held a ’60 Minutes’ story because it was not ready,” Weiss said. “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. 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.”

Weiss also said that the news program needed to get the principal interview subjects “on the record and on camera.” The EIC then added that the viewers of “60 Minutes” come first, not the show’s scheduling.

“That’s my north star and I hope it’s yours, too,” she said.

The “Inside CECOT” episode promised to dive into the “brutal and torturous conditions” inside El Salvador’s megaprison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, which is where the Trump administration has deported hundreds of Venezuelan migrants. The episode was supposed to premiere on CBS Sunday night but was abruptly pulled. The scheduling change happened about two hours before the episode was set to air.

The pulled segment has raised a great deal of attention thus far. Though CBS told TheWrap the report was pulled because it required additional reporting, correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi disputed the claim, calling the removal “a political one” in a leaked memo. She also revealed that the segment had been checked by CBS lawyers as well as the network’s Standards and Practices division. Weiss, who watched it on Friday, was the one who ultimately decided to hold the story.

“If the standard for airing a story is that ‘the government must agree to be interviewed,’ then the government effectively gains control over the ’60 Minutes’ broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state,” Alfonsi wrote.

CBS’ decision to pull the story was immediately met with outrage from many in the media, including veteran reporter Bill Carter. Many also pointed to the suspicious timing around pulling a story that’s critical of the Trump administration. Last week, Trump took to Truth Social to say that he was not close with Paramount Skydance — CBS’ new parent company. He went on to write “please understand that ‘60 Minutes’ has treated me far worse since the so-called ‘takeover,’ than they have ever treated me before. If they are friends, I’d hate to see my enemies.”

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