Longtime “60 Minutes” correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi isn’t leaving the storied news program quietly.
Alfonsi, who has clashed with CBS News top editor Bari Weiss, told “60 Minutes” employees on Wednesday that her contract expired over the weekend.
“The message could not be clearer: my time at 60 Minutes is apparently over,” Alfonsi wrote in a memo, which was obtained by Business Insider.
Alfonsi said her departure followed “an intense editorial dispute” about her December story about the Trump administration’s approach to deporting migrants, specifically involving El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. Weiss delayed Alfonsi’s story, citing a need to get Trump officials to speak on the record. The story eventually ran without those comments.
Weiss defended her decision to delay the story, saying it wasn’t politically motivated.
“Repeated attempts by my representation to establish a path forward were met with absolute silence from network executives,” Alfonsi wrote of her future at “60 Minutes.”
A CBS News spokesperson didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Weiss has shaken up CBS News since being brought on by CEO David Ellison. She installed “CBS This Morning” cohost Tony Dokoupil as the anchor of “CBS Evening News,” among other changes.
Anderson Cooper also recently exited “60 Minutes” after nearly 20 years.
Read Alfonsi’s full memo to “60 Minutes” staffers here:
Over the weekend, my contract with CBS News expired, drawing to a close nearly twenty years with the network, including more than a decade at 60 Minutes. Following an intense editorial dispute over our CECOT story, repeated attempts by my representation to establish a path forward were met with absolute silence from network executives. The message could not be clearer: my time at 60 Minutes is apparently over. In the coming days, network leadership may attempt to hide behind corporate euphemisms like “modernization” and “restructuring” to explain away my departure. Don’t be misled. This was not a routine corporate transition; it was a deliberate choice to penalize a journalist for refusing to sanitize factually accurate reporting, and it sends a chilling message to the entire newsroom. Fearless, independent reporting has always been the defining standard at 60 Minutes. Today, CBS management is abandoning that mission, choosing access journalism over accountability and protecting power rather than scrutinizing it. The wall between editorial independence and corporate interest at CBS is being methodically torn down. Journalists willing to challenge authority are being pushed aside in favor of those who will not. If this continues, the result will be a broadcast that looks like 60 Minutes but lacks the courage and character to produce journalism that matters. To my colleagues, who became family – working beside you has been the privilege of a lifetime. You are second to none. I’ve learned exactly what it costs to hold the line right now. Hold it anyway. Viewers and the people who trust us with their stories deserve nothing less.
Read the full article here
