Scott Pelley was fired by CBS’ 60 Minutes after 37 years with the network.
“There has never been anything in America like 60 Minutes,” Pelley said in a statement on June 2, 2026. “60 has been the number-one program in America for decades because our beloved audience finds integrity, quality and humanity in our stories.”
Us Weekly confirmed earlier that month that Pelley’s contract was terminated after a verbal clash with Nick Bilton, who was named the show’s executive producer in May 2026.
“You should hear this from me first. We have parted ways with Scott Pelley,” a memo sent to staffers and obtained by The Hollywood Reporter reads. “I know how much Scott meant to many of you, and I don’t say this lightly. I made repeated attempts to have direct conversations with him over the weekend, and this afternoon I tried to find common ground. That was not the path Scott chose.”
Keep scrolling to learn more about Pelley’s exit from CBS:
Why Scott Pelley Was Fired
News broke in June 2026 was let go from CBS and 60 Minutes after an alleged verbal altercation with Bilton over his new show leadership.
“Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt,” Bilton told Pelley in an email obtained by NBC News. “I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort.”
Bilton added, “Yesterday’s performative display of hostility — enacted in front of the staff instead of in a civil, private conversation — demonstrated that you have no interest in contributing to the future success of the show or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress.”
Scott Pelley Has Theories About His Firing
In a June 2026 statement, Pelley claimed he was let go because the new CBS bosses wanted to “curry a moment of favor” with President Donald Trump and his administration. (CBS’ parent company, Paramount, was purchased by Skydance Media in 2025.)
“When stewardship of the program passed to my colleagues and me, our responsibility was to expand energetically into a new age of media technology while preserving the values our audience expects,” Pelley said. “The waste is heartbreaking.”
He added, “Last month, 60 Minutes lost its DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on-air correspondents were cruelly fired without cause. Good people were silenced because they stood up for our audience. They stood for fairness against the forces of political bias; they stood for professionalism against chaos.”
Pelley also claimed that he was told to “inject falsehoods and bias” into a politically sensitive story without verifying the claims.
“To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them. Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast,” Pelley alleged. “Giving politicians control over 60 Minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and unprofessionalism in the new management have wreaked havoc.”
CBS denied injecting any political bias into its news coverage.
Bari Weiss Addresses Scott Pelley’s Firing
Weiss, the editor-in-chief of CBS News, issued a statement on June 3, 2026.
“I know I speak for myself, and I hope I speak for everyone here when I say that I’m only interested in working in a newsroom that is built on trust and mutual respect,” Weiss said. “We cannot do our work without it. That foundation was broken on Monday, and 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.”
She continued, “We did not want that to happen, but that’s the path that he chose. That unfortunate outcome does not discount from the amazing contributions and work that Scott Pelley has done for CBS and for 60 Minutes over the course of his career.”
What Has Scott Pelley Said About His CBS Departure?
“I depart after 37 years at CBS with one emotion — a heart brimming with gratitude for the men and women of CBS News who encouraged and enriched my work, very often at the risk of their own lives,” Pelley added in his June 2026 statement. “I pray for a day when those people and their ideals are honored again — a day when sanity, competence and courage return.”
‘60 Minutes’ Staff Say ‘Trust’ Is Gone After Scott Pelley’s Firing
A source exclusively told Us Weekly that “morale is terrible” at CBS following Pelley’s heated clash with executives and his subsequent firing.
“No one knows what to believe or who is working against them. It has never been like this before,” they told Us. “The staff in the newsroom all feel like they cannot trust anyone. How can you work like that?”
The insider pushed back at criticism from some that Pelley was “problematic and disliked” behind the scenes of 60 Minutes because of his dogmatic approach to the news.
“These are not fragile people, they can deal with tough personalities,” the source insisted. “That is not the issue. They are demanding honest communication about the changes that are occurring, and that’s the least they deserve.”
The insider pointed out, “This is happening throughout the company, but especially in the news division.”
‘CBS Evening News’ Pays On Air Tribute to Scott Pelley
Within hours of Pelley’s firing, CBS Evening News host Tony Dokoupil spent more than five minutes on the June 3, 2026, broadcast lavishing praise on his fired colleague.
“When I started at CBS, Scott Pelley was in this very chair, and still doing a dozen stories a year for 60 Minutes. And amid all of that, still meeting every new correspondent to share his view of the mission here,” Dokoupil began. “[Pelley] believed freedom of the press, to quote [James Madison], was ‘the right that guaranteed all the others.’ And the stakes are always that high in that, if you’d made it to CBS News, you were among the best in the world. He worked every single day to live up to that standard.”
Dokoupil credited his colleague with changing the company’s culture when Pelley anchored the CBS Evening News from 2011 to 2017.
“Pelley also made one major break from the past,” Dokoupil mentioned. “He changed the signs around here. Under the CBS Evening News logo, where Scott Pelley’s own name would have been, he instead wrote the CBS Evening News with All of Us. Well, Scott, from all of us, thank you.”
‘60 Minutes’ Correspondents Reveal Their Future on the Show
In the wake of Pelley’s firing, 60 Minutes correspondents Lesley Stahl, Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim announced on June 5, 2026, that they plan to stay with the CBS show, per multiple media outlets.
“We have had a hard time deciding whether to stay at 60 Minutes. We’re still deeply upset by the firings of [executive producer Tanya Simon] and [producer Draggan Mihailovich], strong leaders who everyone respected,” they wrote in a joint memo to staff. “As far as we can tell — because no explanation has ever been offered, they were expelled because they fought for our 60 Minutes values and stood up to protect our independence and integrity. Newsrooms are not supposed to be run like dictatorships. Collaboration and argument are the way we have always worked at 60. [60 Minutes creator] Don Hewitt actually encouraged loud passionate advocacy for our pieces.”
The trio praised Pelley and fellow correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega — who were both let go by CBS last week — for “exemplif[ying] 60 Minutes‘ ethos of tough questions and honest storytelling.”
“We want to express how sorry we are that these principled, fair and honest journalists were treated so shabbily, with such indecency,” the 60 Minutes stars continued. “But, we have decided to stay on. We feared that our returning might be construed as an endorsement of the existing power structure. That is simply, categorically, not the case.”
They added, “We don’t want to see 60 Minutes die. We have been grieving because this whole mess has wounded and damaged the broadcast.”
