Scott Pelley has responded to CBS editor-in-chief Bari Weiss’ comments about his recent departure from the network.
“I am saddened to see the transcript of the CBS News morning editorial meeting,” Pelley, 68, said in a statement shared with The New York Times on Wednesday, June 3. “Bari Weiss knows what she said is not true. In the meeting on Tuesday, in which I was effectively fired, there was no effort of any kind to ‘find a way back’ as Weiss said in the editorial meeting.”
Pelley was fired from CBS and 60 Minutes after 37 years following an alleged verbal argument with new executive producer Nick Bilton over the change in leadership. Weiss, 75, later told the rest of the staff that a “foundation” of trust had been broken.
“I’m only interested in working in a newsroom that is built on trust and mutual respect; we cannot do our work without it,” Weiss said during a conference call on Wednesday, according to an audio recording obtained by The New York Times. “Despite our attempts to engage with Scott Pelley and to find a way back, unfortunately we weren’t able to do so, and so we had to part ways. We did not want that to happen, but that’s the path that he chose.”
Pelley, however, claims that he was let go in a brief meeting with Weiss and CBS News president and executive editor Tom Cibrowski on Tuesday, June 2.
“At no point did anyone in the Tuesday meeting suggest that there could be steps taken by either side that would lead to a resolution,” Pelley said in his statement. “Weiss and Tom Cibrowski were openly hostile from the start. ‘Firing’ was raised by Cibrowski in the first 15 seconds. No CBS executive, at any time, suggested ‘a way back.’ To say so now is disingenuous. And they know it.”
Pelley further alleged that Weiss, Cibrowski and Bilton all “refused to answer [his] questions” about the reasons other CBS staffers were fired last month. (In a previous statement shared on Tuesday, Pelley speculated that the firings were enacted to “curry a moment of favor” with President Donald Trump and his administration.)
“Throughout the meeting, the CBS executives were abrupt, dismissive and uninterested in dialogue,” he claimed on Wednesday. “No constructive criticism dialogue was allowed by the CBS executives at any point. I was stonewalled for about 10 minutes and then, for no apparent reason, [was told], ‘This conversation is over.’”
Pelley continued, “I am pained that the staff of CBS News was misled in the Wednesday morning conference call. These executives cannot gain the trust of the staff with lies. This is antithetical to everything we stand for and reveals contempt for what journalists do.”
Weiss and other CBS executives have not further addressed Pelley’s accusations regarding his departure. Us Weekly has reached out for comment.
