Saying “We don’t want to see ‘60 Minutes’ die,” the three remaining correspondents at the turmoil-plagued CBS News program have decided to stay, for now.
A memo from Lesley Stahl, Jon Wertheim and Bill Whitaker to fellow staffers expressed anger — and grief — over the recent firings at the show, and said the three had had “a hard time” deciding whether to remain.
“Here’s why we are staying: We don’t want to see ‘60 Minutes’ die,” the three wrote in the joint memo obtained by The Associated Press on Friday.
They expressed their regret over the recent firings of colleagues implemented by Bari Weiss, the new CBS News editor-in-chief, and the executive producer she installed last week, Nick Bilton. He replaced Tanya Simon, who was let go after a 30-plus year tenure with the show. Also dismissed were correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, among other top staffers. Scott Pelley was then fired this week after a tense confrontation with CBS News bosses.
“We want to express how sorry we are that these principled, fair and honest journalists were treated so shabbily, with such indecency,” the three correspondents said in their memo. But they said they were “working to build trust” with Bilton, their new boss, and left open the possibility that they could leave later, if need be.
