Tanya Simon, the “60 Minutes” executive producer on the now-shelved investigative segment centered on Donald Trump’s deportations of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador’s CECOT prison, said she had no choice but to fall in line with CBS News’ new editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss’ wishes.
“In the end, our editor in chief had a different vision for how the piece should be, and it came late in the process, and we were not in a position to address the notes,” Simon reportedly told a group of colleagues during a meeting on Monday, per a partial transcript obtained by the Washington Post. “We pushed back, we defended our story, but she wanted changes, and I ultimately had to comply.”
Two hours before its scheduled airing Sunday night, Weiss decided to pull the segment titled “Inside CECOT,” which was set to dive into the “brutal and torturous conditions” inside El Salvador’s megaprison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, where the Trump administration has deported hundreds of Venezuelan migrants.
On Monday, Weiss said her decision to shelve the segment was because it was “not ready.”
“I held a ’60 Minutes’ story because it was not ready,” Weiss told CBS staff on Monday. “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.”
The pulled segment raised a great deal of attention in the media sector. 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.
New York Times writer Michael M. Grynbaum also reported Monday that CBS News reporter Scott Pelley and others shared their frustration with the decision.
“It’s not a part-time job,” Pelley said, referring to Weiss missing screenings of the segment, Grynbaum reports via X, per his sources.
Other media and political figures have also condemned the move.
“This is what government censorship looks like: Trump approved the Paramount-Skydance merger,” Sen. Ed Markey wrote in an X post on Sunday. “A few months later, CBS’s new editor in chief kills a deeply reported story critical of Trump. A sad day for ’60 Minutes’ and journalism.”
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.”
