#60Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley lashed out at the program’s new executive producer Nick Bolton during a Monday meeting, accusing him of “murdering ‘60 Minutes’” and having “slender qualifications for this job.”
CBS News hopes to keep Pelley and the remaining correspondents… pic.twitter.com/PNVszGIEmE
— Variety (@Variety) June 1, 2026
-Longtime 60 minutes correspondent Scott Pelley accused CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss of “murdering” the show, questioning her qualifications and that of the new executive producer, Nick Bilton despite having never worked in traditional broadcast news. Bilton replaced Tanya Simon, a 60 Minutes veteran who was named executive producer last year.
-During a staff meeting, Bilton attempted to ease tension of 60 minutes staff stating “The rumors people are spreading, that I’m going to turn the show into 60 one-minute episodes, that it’s going to be like TikTok, that is not changing. The show is going to stay exactly like it is for now,” Bilton said, per the Times. He also defended Weiss, telling the staff that she “loves 60 Minutes.” Scott Pelley responded, “She is murdering 60 Minutes. She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and she’s been doing exactly that. She has no qualifications for her job; you have slender qualifications for this job. The changes that she’s made at the Evening News have been catastrophic, so why should we expect that any of this is going to be any better?”
-Pelley also confronted Bilton over the firings of Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega asking him why he took a job “knowing that you will never be welcome here,” to which Bilton responded “I have no problem taking a job in a place that I am not welcome in. I don’t think that will be the case,”
-Charles Forelle, a top deputy to Ms. Weiss, urged Mr. Pelley not to act “rude” toward Mr. Bilton. “I’m not being rude,” Mr. Pelley responded. “You know what was rude? Black Thursday was rude.” Referring to the firing spree of Cecilia Vega, 60 Minutes’ first Latina correspondent, and Sharyn Alfonsi, whose feature on torture in Salvadoran prisons that held Donald Trump’s deportees was abruptly pulled by Bari, leading to mass backlash. Draggan Mihailovich, the executive editor of the program, and Matthew Polevoy, a senior producer, were also fired.
-Anderson Cooper who joined 60 Minutes in 2006, ended his 20-year run on the program earlier this month. He gave a thinly veiled critique of Weiss’s overhaul of the network which left Weiss blindsided and furious by the comments, which came just after Cooper decided not to renew his contract.
