Scott Pelley, 68, a veteran reporter for the flagship current affairs program "60 Minutes" on U.S. network CBS, was fired a day after he publicly criticized management.
According to reports by U.S. outlets including the AP on the 2nd, citing media trade publication Status, CBS notified Pelley of his dismissal that day. Pelley previously anchored the CBS Evening News and has long served as a lead correspondent for "60 Minutes."
Pelley was fired immediately after a head-on clash with the new management at a "60 Minutes" production meeting the previous day. According to Status, when Nick Bilton, appointed last month as the new executive producer, began his opening remarks, Pelley immediately cut him off and raised issues publicly.
He criticized Bilton as "poorly qualified to take that position." Bilton has worked as an information technology (IT) journalist and documentary producer, but is said to lack experience producing a traditional weekly news program.
Pelley also said Barry Weiss, head of CBS News, "has no qualifications for that position whatsoever," and criticized changes to the CBS Evening News as "catastrophic."
When Bilton defended Weiss, saying, "Weiss loves this organization and '60 Minutes,'" Pelley shot back, "He is killing '60 Minutes.' He does not love this place. He was brought in to kill this organization, and that is exactly what he is doing."
Pelley also squarely criticized the recent large-scale restructuring. He called the dismissal of veteran producers "cruel," and producers attending the meeting reportedly responded with multiple rounds of applause.
In fact, at the end of last month CBS fired Tanya Simon, who had been the executive producer of "60 Minutes," as well as marquee correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega. Bilton and Weiss are said to have replaced many core producers during the restructuring.
On the evening of the 2nd, the day after the meeting, Pelley met with Weiss, CBS News President Tom Sbrocchi, Bilton and a human resources official, after which he was notified of his dismissal. The "60 Minutes" staff was later informed of Pelley's firing.
Some analysts say political controversy surrounding CBS lies behind the incident. Paramount, CBS's parent company, was acquired in Aug. last year by Skydance Media, led by David Ellison. David Ellison is the son of Larry Ellison, the Oracle co-founder known as a longtime acquaintance of U.S. President Donald Trump.
During the acquisition process, Skydance pledged that CBS would "reflect a diversity of ideological viewpoints." The media industry interpreted that as a signal to soften CBS News' traditional progressive tilt and strengthen a conservative bent.
Before the acquisition, Paramount bought The Free Press, a publication founded by Weiss, who is known as a conservative-leaning journalist, for $150 million (228.3 billion won). It also settled a lawsuit over alleged biased "60 Minutes" coverage filed by President Trump in 2024 by agreeing to pay $16 million (24.352 billion won).
Weiss was appointed head of CBS News in Oct. 2025. Since then, concerns have steadily been raised in the media industry that the new management is overly close to the Trump administration.
Sharyn Alfonsi, who was recently dismissed, had publicly raised issues late last year after a report on immigrant deportation policy was canceled just before airtime. Cecilia Vega also criticized after her dismissal that CBS is facing both external pressure and internal censorship.
CBS also recently canceled the 33-year-old political satire program "The Late Show." Host Stephen Colbert had led the program for 11 years since 2015.
Earlier, in Feb., Anderson Cooper, who had hosted "60 Minutes" for 20 years, also left the company without a renewal.
Both Colbert and Cooper are known as broadcasters whom President Trump has publicly criticized.