June 3, 2026
‘60 Minutes’ Veteran Scott Pelley Fired By New Boss; He Didn’t Leave Quietly!
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RSS Feed Well, that didn’t take long. New ‘60 Minutes’ EP Nick Bilton fired Scott Pelley after Monday morning’s staff meeting that he says Pelley “hijacked” to disparage him. Pelley fired back with a statement of his own, alleging that new management has instructed him to “inject falsehoods and bias” into his reporting. What happens now to the legendary broadcast now that’s it’s lost 4 of its 7 correspondents and most of its senior producing staff.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey, they're folks. It is Wednesday, June third, and he has been the name and the face of CBS News and in particular sixty Minutes for decades. But Scott Pelly just got fired with that. Welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. Robes. This escalated quickly, meeting on Monday. He was fired on Tuesday.
00:00:25
Speaker 2: Yes, and look, according to at least one side, there were attempts to try and talk it out, to work it out, but man, they were on opposite sides of the fence, and Scott Pelly made it known.
00:00:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, folks, we're going to share with you two letters. One is the termination letter. The other is Pelly's response to being fired. Good lord, this is probably not going to be the end of it, Robes. A lot of this stuff sounds Yes, there's anger, there's emotion, but a lot of this sounds personal. A lot of this sound owns almost taking shots at each other to a certain degree, Robes. And this is just a shame. This is sixty Minutes, This is Scott Pelly, Robes. This is a different generation, I know, but can you imagine a new person coming in and buying Mike Wallace because of an argument they were having in a meeting, just he's an institution of the institution.
00:01:21
Speaker 2: Right, And the problem is the folks who have been brought in by the owners of that institution aren't a part of the institution, and so there's an absolute us versus them mentality. There's a concern because sixty minutes is the legendary broadcast that it is. It deserves to be protected, does it not by the people who know it best. Understand that times changed, Understand that tactics might need to shift in terms of continuing to at least keep your audience, but perhaps yes, grow an audience. But when you don't have the respect of the staff, how can you lead? And if the staff isn't even considered or consulted when you're figuring out who to put at the helm, that's a problem. I mean, this all was a domino effect.
00:02:10
Speaker 1: Let's I guess we should be clear on a couple of points. Robes Barry Weiss can do whatever she wants and can hire whoever she wants. She can have whatever vision that she has and hasn't had a chance to fully implement it. But Ropes she can do what she wants. We can look from the outside all day long, so we can't believe and don't like it, and this change has been made. And why does she hire Nick Bilton, who has no television broadcast experience, to be the executi producer of sixty minutes No Robes. Traditionally that doesn't make sense. But she was brought in to do exactly that right, not do the status quo correct as extreme as it might sound to us, she can do what she wants. It should be said as well, Robes, the behavior was probably at minimum a suspendable offense.
00:03:00
Speaker 3: Well, I think absolutely.
00:03:01
Speaker 2: If Scott Pelly was anybody else and said what he said, he would have most likely been fired on this spot in terms of what he said to his boss and where he said it and who he said it in front of. All of those are massive, huge no nos. And Scott Pelly knows that he understood exactly what he was doing and the price he may pay, and maybe it was a price he was more than willing to pay.
00:03:24
Speaker 3: Kind of sounds like it was.
00:03:26
Speaker 1: And did he know did he think? Was he?
00:03:29
Speaker 2: Was?
00:03:29
Speaker 1: He on his way out anyway, He's like the hell with this and what's happening here? I don't actually think so I think he actually appreciates and loves and wants to protect that institution sixty minutes. I don't think he wanted to. I don't know if he saw this coming, was he thinking this through. I don't know.
00:03:43
Speaker 2: I think Look, when you see valued members of your staff, your leaders, your senior top producers, your executive producer, colleagues who you work alongside with get fired without cause, you feel a duty, maybe even an obligation, to honor them and the work they put in by standing up for them, to stand up for the voiceless. That is what journalists are tasked to do oftentimes. And maybe he felt like this was a role only he could assume, and maybe he did think he was protected.
00:04:16
Speaker 1: You just said something that the debate is going on. Of course, a lot of politics has come into this, but Rome, some people do take issue with legacy media and with CBS, and even with a show like that, and even with a journalist like Scott Pelley, essentially saying, who when did you assign yourself the sole keeper of truth? Like you call yourself the gatekeeper? Why is it that you get to decide what truth is now? I am not saying I agree with those folks, But Rodes, there is a different side and another argument out there about why not and why is it that you get to be the sole truth keeper.
00:04:56
Speaker 2: Yes, but I guess when you've got these journalists who have operated a certain way, who are all now and I shouldn't say all, but several of them Scott Pelly included when you hear his response to him being fired, have all detailed specific and several instances where they are being told to change their story, to change the editorial of their story, and it isn't justifiable. And so then who is supposed to stand up for that? Who is supposed to stand up for truth?
00:05:31
Speaker 1: Well again, so there are other folks in there who would take issue with that, who absolutely did. When Cecilia left, they put out a statement saying it was what fantasy what was the word they used. But Rose, they would absolutely refute that. They would say they're doing things differently. You all, some of you in here are bringing your bias into this edit bay, and you need another voice. Again, that's just the part of the argument here, Rose. But no matter what, sixty minutes is a precious show and you hate to see this happening to it. Four of the seven correspondents are gone.
00:06:07
Speaker 2: Yes, and look, if you think about how this all started and why the sixty minute staff is exceptionally or especially distrustful of the leadership that was brought in. Look, this all came about because President Trump put a target on sixty minutes back he threw a lawsuit at CBS News specifically referencing sixty minutes. So he has had his eyes set on this news magazine from the beginning. And so yes, the people who worked there have felt under attack, and this just brings it right to their front door.
00:06:41
Speaker 1: Even sixty Minutes couldn't be protected. So we told you about the meeting that took place earlier this week. It was just supposed to be an introductory meeting for Nick Builton, the new EP, to meet everybody on the staff. Now he comes in, like we said, resume is light when it comes to television news. He is a documentarian and a tech journalists for the New York Times. That was pretty much his resume. So they get into it. In the meeting. Scott accused Scott Pelly accuses Barry Weiss of she wasn't in there, but he says she's murdering. The show told this guy, he has very limited qualifications, just goes off in front of everybody, and by all accounts, it was pretty hostile and it was rude. So he got a letter yesterday Robes that he was no longer going to be employed at CBS.
00:07:27
Speaker 3: New Here was Scott Pelly's termination letter? And where was this published? Or how did this get out? This letter?
00:07:33
Speaker 1: He knew it was going to get out, but it was written by Nick Bilton. His name is on it.
00:07:37
Speaker 3: Nick Bilton wrote this and it was leaked.
00:07:39
Speaker 1: Ya day two, you fire Scott Pelly.
00:07:43
Speaker 2: My goodness, wow, Okay, here it reads. Dear mister Pelly, I meant what I said in my letter last week to the sixty minutes team. Joining sixty minutes is the honor of my career, and I am grateful to be working alongside the people who have contributed to the most important television journalism brand this country has ever produced. While I'm new to sixty minutes, I've devoted my career to investigative journalism and storytelling. I started this job excited to collaborate and to benefit from the wisdom and experience of the sixty minute veterans, with you among them. For that reason, one of the first things I did in my new role was call you to talk and invite you to dinner. It is a profound disappointment that you rejected that overture and chose ambush instead. Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt. I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort. 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 approach my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress. I am here to deliver first in class news programming, not to make headlines about newsroom drama. I am eager to work alongside those who share this goal. Despite yesterday's misconduct, I had hoped that in sitting down with you today, we could find a path forward together. You made clear that you are not interested in such a path. Your antipathy for the future of the show has come through loud and clear, and I have heard you. Therefore, I therefore write on behalf of CBS News, Inc. To inform you that your employment with CBS is terminated for cause effective Immediately. Enclosed is your formal termination letter.
00:09:50
Speaker 1: Wow, that's tough. That's direct, performative display of hostility. It did it felt that way in Rome. Is this is rude behavior, this is in considerate behavior. You don't show up the boss, the new balls, You just don't do it. So people are split. He's a hero, right, He's standing up for journalism, he's standing up for the truth, pushing back against the administration and all this, and you got another side cheering.
00:10:19
Speaker 2: Well, I was just going to say, remember, yes, Monday's meeting when Bilton walked out, the entire staff erupted in applause for Pelly. So where does this leave them now that Pelly's just been fired? Are they scared? Are more people going to quit? Are people going to get in line? You get, I guess one choice or the other.
00:10:41
Speaker 1: I mean, I swear I would not be surprised by an all out revolt. I wouldn't be surprised if everybody on that staff got together and said, no, no, we are not going to do this. Now given what we've seen, they might just fire them all in sixty minutes, will run reruns for the next several weeks until they get a new staff in place. I don't know, but this is that's gotta be devastating to that staff. That show is precious, it really is. It is for a lottery. No matter what your politics might be, this thing has has produced some of the best moments in journalism over the years.
00:11:17
Speaker 2: My goodness, But to think, as you said, four of the seven correspondents gone, Cecilia Vega gone, Scott Pelly gone, Anderson Cooper gone, Sharon Alphonsie gone.
00:11:27
Speaker 1: Who's leftist? I was actually Leslie Stall, Bill Whittaker, and who's the third.
00:11:35
Speaker 3: I'm trying to who.
00:11:36
Speaker 1: It was only seven that they keep on staff over there, and four of them are gone. And again Anderson Cooper left because he said he just oky he could say what he wants to say. He apparently saw the writing on the wall.
00:11:46
Speaker 3: I mean he got out. It sounds like just in time.
00:11:49
Speaker 2: So yes, Leslie Stall, Bill Whittaker, and John Wartime or war.
00:11:53
Speaker 1: Time Lily that's and then there were three that's insane. Three just got out of there in the past what five days.
00:12:03
Speaker 2: My goodness, and four within the last month. And do you think about four top producers not sure how big their producing staff is, but executive producer her next in line, and then two other senior producers. I mean, you've just decimated, decimated. And it seems from what folks have been saying, the people who got fired were the people who pushed back, the people who were upset by the direction Barry Weiss was taking the show, who were upset by editorially what was happening to their pieces.
00:12:34
Speaker 1: I'll be watching on Sunday for sure, But you olden think Scott Peley was going to go quietly into that good night? Did you uh uh stay here? You got to hear his statement.
00:12:53
Speaker 2: Welcome back everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ.
00:12:56
Speaker 3: We are talking about.
00:12:57
Speaker 2: Wow, just the continued fallout over at sixty minutes. Scott Pelley has been fired one day after that contentious meeting, that staff meeting to introduce the new executive producer of sixty Minutes Nick built into the staff. Scott Pelly made his feelings known. He was applauded by his staff and today he is out of a job.
00:13:19
Speaker 3: But he did not go quietly.
00:13:21
Speaker 2: No, he did.
00:13:21
Speaker 1: He has a fairly long statement, but the first of it he starts and he kind of just sets it up. There's never been anything in America like sixty minutes, and talks about the legacy, and then he picks up by saying, now the new owner of our network is casting this legend aside, apparently to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration. The waste is heartbreaking. Whereas he didn't have to, he went in this statement and named Trump and is blaming the administration and saying they are in cahoots. He continues saying, last month, sixty Minutes lost the DNA. It's DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on air correspondence 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. Robes Y, I don't know does sixty Minutes is it going to be able to recover from this type And we'll continue here in a second with his statement, but Robes, you have a trusted voice, a trusted name on a trusted show. Now saying he doesn't trust it.
00:14:41
Speaker 2: Right, So what does someone like Leslie Stall do talk about a storied journalist whose credibility is up there with the best of the best.
00:14:50
Speaker 3: Where is she? And all of this have not heard a peep from her?
00:14:54
Speaker 1: And I bet you won't unless she wants to get fired ropes And then there were three I want to put on the show.
00:15:02
Speaker 2: My goodness, King in the moment, you're gonna she stretched a little thin Yeah. I wonder, though, when you have major respected journalists like these standing up and collectively speaking out and all saying the same story. Because we'll continue to read his statement, which gets into some of the details, you wonder what the other respected journalists are feeling, how much pressure they're feeling, if they're concerned, if they're struggling right now with what to do. I can't imagine that position.
00:15:30
Speaker 1: He continues here to what you were just saying. There, Ropes, he said, for my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. Holy hell, stop the press robes. New managers telling him to inject lies and bias.
00:15:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, he said, I've been told to include assertions that are unverified he said. To date, in every case I have managed to ignore these instructions refuse them. Recently, this one's crazy. Politicians have been invited to choose correspondence for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over sixty minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and on professionalism in the new management have reached havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within nineteen minutes of not getting on the air at all.
00:16:27
Speaker 1: How many more stories are going to start coming out now about this not being a program. Well, if the credibility of sixty minutes goes away, we're doing. We're due, We've got this is You can turn on anywhere and call everybody bias for the most part, but this is one, right, this is the one we can all get on board with.
00:16:44
Speaker 2: Yes, we all grew up watching this storied broadcast on our televisions. I still remember and just knowing that what you were hearing was solid investigative reporting, where this is what the list with the capital J work.
00:17:02
Speaker 1: Well, who is the I can't remember that. I don't know why. I'm just having this memory and amaze me smile. The guy who used to do his commentary at the end, the like the comic he was. He did a funny commentary at the end. He did it for years and Rooney.
00:17:14
Speaker 3: Oh okay, yes, oh my god, that's so amazing that.
00:17:19
Speaker 1: We'll continue here with Scott Kelly his statement saying, we fought harder than anyone knows to save the program that became an American icon. We owe that to our millions of viewers. I am deeply moved by the thousands of wishes we have received to keep up the good fight. Most of the men and women of CBS News are still in that fight, but now the collapse of values at the top has become untenable. The leadership of sixty Minutes is no longer recognizable. The principles I hold deer are gone, and so I must leave as well.
00:17:51
Speaker 3: Damn woo yeah, and he said.
00:17:56
Speaker 2: I depart after thirty seven 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. I pray for a day when those people and their ideals are honored again a day when sanity, competence, and courage return.
00:18:21
Speaker 1: We're insane, incompetent. There's a collapse of values. The leadership is no longer recognizable. Whoa roach. This is the most damning. This is the most damning thing for a news network, for your most respected guy to step out of the building and say, what's going on in there? Is BS well that has no more credible source than Scott Peling.
00:18:48
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean this is I feel like we are witnessing CBS News being dismantled in front of our eyes.
00:18:55
Speaker 1: And that might be exactly what she wants to do, and she's got every right to do it.
00:19:00
Speaker 2: I guess that may be what she was told to do according to Scott Pelly.
00:19:05
Speaker 3: He claims that was her job.
00:19:08
Speaker 1: And is being accomplished. And with that, folks, we just wanted to give you that update. There will be more on this story. I'm sure this week we will hear more in quite frankly gropes. I think CBS has to say something to refute some of this, so we will keep you updated, folk, who always appreciate you spending some time with us. But for my dear Amy Robot, I'm TJ Holmes talksing
Speaker 1: Hey, they're folks. It is Wednesday, June third, and he has been the name and the face of CBS News and in particular sixty Minutes for decades. But Scott Pelly just got fired with that. Welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. Robes. This escalated quickly, meeting on Monday. He was fired on Tuesday.
00:00:25
Speaker 2: Yes, and look, according to at least one side, there were attempts to try and talk it out, to work it out, but man, they were on opposite sides of the fence, and Scott Pelly made it known.
00:00:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, folks, we're going to share with you two letters. One is the termination letter. The other is Pelly's response to being fired. Good lord, this is probably not going to be the end of it, Robes. A lot of this stuff sounds Yes, there's anger, there's emotion, but a lot of this sounds personal. A lot of this sound owns almost taking shots at each other to a certain degree, Robes. And this is just a shame. This is sixty Minutes, This is Scott Pelly, Robes. This is a different generation, I know, but can you imagine a new person coming in and buying Mike Wallace because of an argument they were having in a meeting, just he's an institution of the institution.
00:01:21
Speaker 2: Right, And the problem is the folks who have been brought in by the owners of that institution aren't a part of the institution, and so there's an absolute us versus them mentality. There's a concern because sixty minutes is the legendary broadcast that it is. It deserves to be protected, does it not by the people who know it best. Understand that times changed, Understand that tactics might need to shift in terms of continuing to at least keep your audience, but perhaps yes, grow an audience. But when you don't have the respect of the staff, how can you lead? And if the staff isn't even considered or consulted when you're figuring out who to put at the helm, that's a problem. I mean, this all was a domino effect.
00:02:10
Speaker 1: Let's I guess we should be clear on a couple of points. Robes Barry Weiss can do whatever she wants and can hire whoever she wants. She can have whatever vision that she has and hasn't had a chance to fully implement it. But Ropes she can do what she wants. We can look from the outside all day long, so we can't believe and don't like it, and this change has been made. And why does she hire Nick Bilton, who has no television broadcast experience, to be the executi producer of sixty minutes No Robes. Traditionally that doesn't make sense. But she was brought in to do exactly that right, not do the status quo correct as extreme as it might sound to us, she can do what she wants. It should be said as well, Robes, the behavior was probably at minimum a suspendable offense.
00:03:00
Speaker 3: Well, I think absolutely.
00:03:01
Speaker 2: If Scott Pelly was anybody else and said what he said, he would have most likely been fired on this spot in terms of what he said to his boss and where he said it and who he said it in front of. All of those are massive, huge no nos. And Scott Pelly knows that he understood exactly what he was doing and the price he may pay, and maybe it was a price he was more than willing to pay.
00:03:24
Speaker 3: Kind of sounds like it was.
00:03:26
Speaker 1: And did he know did he think? Was he?
00:03:29
Speaker 2: Was?
00:03:29
Speaker 1: He on his way out anyway, He's like the hell with this and what's happening here? I don't actually think so I think he actually appreciates and loves and wants to protect that institution sixty minutes. I don't think he wanted to. I don't know if he saw this coming, was he thinking this through. I don't know.
00:03:43
Speaker 2: I think Look, when you see valued members of your staff, your leaders, your senior top producers, your executive producer, colleagues who you work alongside with get fired without cause, you feel a duty, maybe even an obligation, to honor them and the work they put in by standing up for them, to stand up for the voiceless. That is what journalists are tasked to do oftentimes. And maybe he felt like this was a role only he could assume, and maybe he did think he was protected.
00:04:16
Speaker 1: You just said something that the debate is going on. Of course, a lot of politics has come into this, but Rome, some people do take issue with legacy media and with CBS, and even with a show like that, and even with a journalist like Scott Pelley, essentially saying, who when did you assign yourself the sole keeper of truth? Like you call yourself the gatekeeper? Why is it that you get to decide what truth is now? I am not saying I agree with those folks, But Rodes, there is a different side and another argument out there about why not and why is it that you get to be the sole truth keeper.
00:04:56
Speaker 2: Yes, but I guess when you've got these journalists who have operated a certain way, who are all now and I shouldn't say all, but several of them Scott Pelly included when you hear his response to him being fired, have all detailed specific and several instances where they are being told to change their story, to change the editorial of their story, and it isn't justifiable. And so then who is supposed to stand up for that? Who is supposed to stand up for truth?
00:05:31
Speaker 1: Well again, so there are other folks in there who would take issue with that, who absolutely did. When Cecilia left, they put out a statement saying it was what fantasy what was the word they used. But Rose, they would absolutely refute that. They would say they're doing things differently. You all, some of you in here are bringing your bias into this edit bay, and you need another voice. Again, that's just the part of the argument here, Rose. But no matter what, sixty minutes is a precious show and you hate to see this happening to it. Four of the seven correspondents are gone.
00:06:07
Speaker 2: Yes, and look, if you think about how this all started and why the sixty minute staff is exceptionally or especially distrustful of the leadership that was brought in. Look, this all came about because President Trump put a target on sixty minutes back he threw a lawsuit at CBS News specifically referencing sixty minutes. So he has had his eyes set on this news magazine from the beginning. And so yes, the people who worked there have felt under attack, and this just brings it right to their front door.
00:06:41
Speaker 1: Even sixty Minutes couldn't be protected. So we told you about the meeting that took place earlier this week. It was just supposed to be an introductory meeting for Nick Builton, the new EP, to meet everybody on the staff. Now he comes in, like we said, resume is light when it comes to television news. He is a documentarian and a tech journalists for the New York Times. That was pretty much his resume. So they get into it. In the meeting. Scott accused Scott Pelly accuses Barry Weiss of she wasn't in there, but he says she's murdering. The show told this guy, he has very limited qualifications, just goes off in front of everybody, and by all accounts, it was pretty hostile and it was rude. So he got a letter yesterday Robes that he was no longer going to be employed at CBS.
00:07:27
Speaker 3: New Here was Scott Pelly's termination letter? And where was this published? Or how did this get out? This letter?
00:07:33
Speaker 1: He knew it was going to get out, but it was written by Nick Bilton. His name is on it.
00:07:37
Speaker 3: Nick Bilton wrote this and it was leaked.
00:07:39
Speaker 1: Ya day two, you fire Scott Pelly.
00:07:43
Speaker 2: My goodness, wow, Okay, here it reads. Dear mister Pelly, I meant what I said in my letter last week to the sixty minutes team. Joining sixty minutes is the honor of my career, and I am grateful to be working alongside the people who have contributed to the most important television journalism brand this country has ever produced. While I'm new to sixty minutes, I've devoted my career to investigative journalism and storytelling. I started this job excited to collaborate and to benefit from the wisdom and experience of the sixty minute veterans, with you among them. For that reason, one of the first things I did in my new role was call you to talk and invite you to dinner. It is a profound disappointment that you rejected that overture and chose ambush instead. Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt. I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort. 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 approach my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress. I am here to deliver first in class news programming, not to make headlines about newsroom drama. I am eager to work alongside those who share this goal. Despite yesterday's misconduct, I had hoped that in sitting down with you today, we could find a path forward together. You made clear that you are not interested in such a path. Your antipathy for the future of the show has come through loud and clear, and I have heard you. Therefore, I therefore write on behalf of CBS News, Inc. To inform you that your employment with CBS is terminated for cause effective Immediately. Enclosed is your formal termination letter.
00:09:50
Speaker 1: Wow, that's tough. That's direct, performative display of hostility. It did it felt that way in Rome. Is this is rude behavior, this is in considerate behavior. You don't show up the boss, the new balls, You just don't do it. So people are split. He's a hero, right, He's standing up for journalism, he's standing up for the truth, pushing back against the administration and all this, and you got another side cheering.
00:10:19
Speaker 2: Well, I was just going to say, remember, yes, Monday's meeting when Bilton walked out, the entire staff erupted in applause for Pelly. So where does this leave them now that Pelly's just been fired? Are they scared? Are more people going to quit? Are people going to get in line? You get, I guess one choice or the other.
00:10:41
Speaker 1: I mean, I swear I would not be surprised by an all out revolt. I wouldn't be surprised if everybody on that staff got together and said, no, no, we are not going to do this. Now given what we've seen, they might just fire them all in sixty minutes, will run reruns for the next several weeks until they get a new staff in place. I don't know, but this is that's gotta be devastating to that staff. That show is precious, it really is. It is for a lottery. No matter what your politics might be, this thing has has produced some of the best moments in journalism over the years.
00:11:17
Speaker 2: My goodness, But to think, as you said, four of the seven correspondents gone, Cecilia Vega gone, Scott Pelly gone, Anderson Cooper gone, Sharon Alphonsie gone.
00:11:27
Speaker 1: Who's leftist? I was actually Leslie Stall, Bill Whittaker, and who's the third.
00:11:35
Speaker 3: I'm trying to who.
00:11:36
Speaker 1: It was only seven that they keep on staff over there, and four of them are gone. And again Anderson Cooper left because he said he just oky he could say what he wants to say. He apparently saw the writing on the wall.
00:11:46
Speaker 3: I mean he got out. It sounds like just in time.
00:11:49
Speaker 2: So yes, Leslie Stall, Bill Whittaker, and John Wartime or war.
00:11:53
Speaker 1: Time Lily that's and then there were three that's insane. Three just got out of there in the past what five days.
00:12:03
Speaker 2: My goodness, and four within the last month. And do you think about four top producers not sure how big their producing staff is, but executive producer her next in line, and then two other senior producers. I mean, you've just decimated, decimated. And it seems from what folks have been saying, the people who got fired were the people who pushed back, the people who were upset by the direction Barry Weiss was taking the show, who were upset by editorially what was happening to their pieces.
00:12:34
Speaker 1: I'll be watching on Sunday for sure, But you olden think Scott Peley was going to go quietly into that good night? Did you uh uh stay here? You got to hear his statement.
00:12:53
Speaker 2: Welcome back everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ.
00:12:56
Speaker 3: We are talking about.
00:12:57
Speaker 2: Wow, just the continued fallout over at sixty minutes. Scott Pelley has been fired one day after that contentious meeting, that staff meeting to introduce the new executive producer of sixty Minutes Nick built into the staff. Scott Pelly made his feelings known. He was applauded by his staff and today he is out of a job.
00:13:19
Speaker 3: But he did not go quietly.
00:13:21
Speaker 2: No, he did.
00:13:21
Speaker 1: He has a fairly long statement, but the first of it he starts and he kind of just sets it up. There's never been anything in America like sixty minutes, and talks about the legacy, and then he picks up by saying, now the new owner of our network is casting this legend aside, apparently to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration. The waste is heartbreaking. Whereas he didn't have to, he went in this statement and named Trump and is blaming the administration and saying they are in cahoots. He continues saying, last month, sixty Minutes lost the DNA. It's DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on air correspondence 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. Robes Y, I don't know does sixty Minutes is it going to be able to recover from this type And we'll continue here in a second with his statement, but Robes, you have a trusted voice, a trusted name on a trusted show. Now saying he doesn't trust it.
00:14:41
Speaker 2: Right, So what does someone like Leslie Stall do talk about a storied journalist whose credibility is up there with the best of the best.
00:14:50
Speaker 3: Where is she? And all of this have not heard a peep from her?
00:14:54
Speaker 1: And I bet you won't unless she wants to get fired ropes And then there were three I want to put on the show.
00:15:02
Speaker 2: My goodness, King in the moment, you're gonna she stretched a little thin Yeah. I wonder, though, when you have major respected journalists like these standing up and collectively speaking out and all saying the same story. Because we'll continue to read his statement, which gets into some of the details, you wonder what the other respected journalists are feeling, how much pressure they're feeling, if they're concerned, if they're struggling right now with what to do. I can't imagine that position.
00:15:30
Speaker 1: He continues here to what you were just saying. There, Ropes, he said, for my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. Holy hell, stop the press robes. New managers telling him to inject lies and bias.
00:15:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, he said, I've been told to include assertions that are unverified he said. To date, in every case I have managed to ignore these instructions refuse them. Recently, this one's crazy. Politicians have been invited to choose correspondence for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over sixty minutes interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and on professionalism in the new management have reached havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within nineteen minutes of not getting on the air at all.
00:16:27
Speaker 1: How many more stories are going to start coming out now about this not being a program. Well, if the credibility of sixty minutes goes away, we're doing. We're due, We've got this is You can turn on anywhere and call everybody bias for the most part, but this is one, right, this is the one we can all get on board with.
00:16:44
Speaker 2: Yes, we all grew up watching this storied broadcast on our televisions. I still remember and just knowing that what you were hearing was solid investigative reporting, where this is what the list with the capital J work.
00:17:02
Speaker 1: Well, who is the I can't remember that. I don't know why. I'm just having this memory and amaze me smile. The guy who used to do his commentary at the end, the like the comic he was. He did a funny commentary at the end. He did it for years and Rooney.
00:17:14
Speaker 3: Oh okay, yes, oh my god, that's so amazing that.
00:17:19
Speaker 1: We'll continue here with Scott Kelly his statement saying, we fought harder than anyone knows to save the program that became an American icon. We owe that to our millions of viewers. I am deeply moved by the thousands of wishes we have received to keep up the good fight. Most of the men and women of CBS News are still in that fight, but now the collapse of values at the top has become untenable. The leadership of sixty Minutes is no longer recognizable. The principles I hold deer are gone, and so I must leave as well.
00:17:51
Speaker 3: Damn woo yeah, and he said.
00:17:56
Speaker 2: I depart after thirty seven 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. I pray for a day when those people and their ideals are honored again a day when sanity, competence, and courage return.
00:18:21
Speaker 1: We're insane, incompetent. There's a collapse of values. The leadership is no longer recognizable. Whoa roach. This is the most damning. This is the most damning thing for a news network, for your most respected guy to step out of the building and say, what's going on in there? Is BS well that has no more credible source than Scott Peling.
00:18:48
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean this is I feel like we are witnessing CBS News being dismantled in front of our eyes.
00:18:55
Speaker 1: And that might be exactly what she wants to do, and she's got every right to do it.
00:19:00
Speaker 2: I guess that may be what she was told to do according to Scott Pelly.
00:19:05
Speaker 3: He claims that was her job.
00:19:08
Speaker 1: And is being accomplished. And with that, folks, we just wanted to give you that update. There will be more on this story. I'm sure this week we will hear more in quite frankly gropes. I think CBS has to say something to refute some of this, so we will keep you updated, folk, who always appreciate you spending some time with us. But for my dear Amy Robot, I'm TJ Holmes talksing