Veteran anchor Chris Wallace has joined RedBird Capital Partners as a senior advisor. He will work on the business side of the firm, reporting directly to founder Gerry Cardinale.
Wallace joins RedBird after exiting CNN last year following the expiration of his contract. Prior to CNN, he had a nearly two-decade run at Fox, spent 14 years at ABC News as chief correspondent for “Primetime Thursday” and a substitute host for “Nightline,” and was NBC’s chief White House correspondent and moderated “Meet the Press.”
It also comes as RedBird, an investor in Skydance Media, has contributed financing to its $8 billion merger with Paramount Global. Cardinale will serve as a member of New Paramount’s board of directors, while RedBird partner Andy Gordon has been named chief operating and strategy officer.
The 77-year-old, who is the son of the late “60 Minutes” correspondent Mike Wallace, told The New York Times that he is likely to advise on strategy for RedBird media assets such as The Daily Telegraph rather than CBS News.
While Wallace noted that any direct input for the latter is “TBD,” he said that he’s spoken with New Paramount CEO David Ellison several times and that he wants to “help him in any way I can.”
In order to secure regulatory approval, Ellison agreed to launch a “comprehensive review” of CBS and agreed to appoint an ombudsman to review complaints of bias for at least two years. New Paramount president Jeff Shell has said the ombudsman is a “transparency vehicle, not an oversight vehicle,” clarifying that the process at Paramount is not being “overseen by the FCC or anybody else.”
“I am absolutely convinced that any talk about the new owners wanting to move CBS News in a particular political direction is absolutely mistaken,” Wallace said, adding that Ellison “wants a news organization that lives up to the tradition of Cronkite and Murrow and my dad.”
When asked about CBS’ recent $16 million settlement with President Trump, Wallace declined to comment directly. However, he gave the following perspective about “60 Minutes” and CBS:
“My stepfather, Bill Leonard, helped invent ‘60 Minutes,’ and of course my father was one of the first two anchors. In the early years, and in fact for years thereafter, it was routine that executives of CBS News would screen pieces and comment on them and expect their comments to be acted on,” he said. “I’ve been a little surprised at this notion that somehow ‘60 Minutes’ is an independent entity that isn’t part of CBS News.”
Though he originally considered starting a podcast or independent journalism venture after his departure from CNN, Wallace noted it “just didn’t hold any particular excitement for me.” He also said that a return to being in front of the camera “isn’t something that’s in the cards” at this point.
“At this moment in the evolution of the news business, I think a place in the C-suite is more interesting, and even more important, than being in front of a camera,” he added.
RedBird Capital Partners has $12 billion in assets under management and over 50 portfolio companies representing over $60 billion in enterprise value.
