Longtime “60 Minutes” Correspondent Admits She Could Be Fired for Speaking Out Against Bari Weiss' 'Corporate Meddling'
Longtime “60 Minutes” Correspondent Admits She Could Be Fired for Speaking Out Against Bari Weiss' 'Corporate Meddling'
Joseph KonigFri, May 1, 2026 at 6:16 PM UTC
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"60 Minutes" correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi. CBS News editor-in-chief Bari WeissCredit: Michele Crowe/CBS via Getty; Leigh Vogel/Getty -
Sharyn Alfonsi, an award-winning 60 Minutes correspondent, denounced "the spread of corporate meddling and editorial fear" after airing her grievances with a broadcasting decision made by CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss
Alfonsi said "it's hard to watch" the network's direction after her bosses initially refused to air a December 2025 segment on the notorious El Salvador prison where the Trump administration has been sending immigrants
Alfonsi commented that she fears for her future at the network while accepting the Ridenhour Prize for Courage at the National Press Club on Thursday, April 30
An award-winning 60 Minutes correspondent denounced the recent “spread of corporate meddling and editorial fear” in newsrooms and admitted she's living with uncertainty about whether she will be fired after speaking out against CBS News boss Bari Weiss.
Sharyn Alfonsi, an 11-year veteran of the program, said “it’s hard to watch” the direction that media is going, particularly after a newly installed Weiss initially refused to air a December 2025 report on the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador, where the Trump administration was sending Venezuelan migrants.
The maximum security prison has been accused of human rights violations, torture, and inhumane conditions by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, U.S. senators, and other human rights organizations.
“I will not linger on the internal mechanics of the dust-up at CBS that led to our CECOT story being pulled, but we have to be honest about what it represents,” Alfonsi said on Thursday, April 30, as she accepted the Ridenhour Prize for Courage at the National Press Club, according to The Guardian.
“It wasn’t an isolated editorial argument. In my view, it was the result of a more aggressive contagion: the spread of corporate meddling and editorial fear," Alfonsi, 53, claimed. "It’s hard to watch.”
CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss speaks to Erika Kirk for a special that aired Dec. 13, 2025.Credit: Michele Crowe/CBS News via Getty
The paper reported that the crowd booed when an earlier speaker mentioned Weiss, though Alfonsi apparently did not mention her by name.
“Some executives are asking not, ‘Is the story true?’ But, ‘Is it good for business?’ ” she said.
CBS News did not immediately respond to a request for comment from PEOPLE about Alfonsi's remarks.
Weiss — who has been accused by critics and CBS alumni like Katie Couric of being too sympathetic to the Trump administration — reportedly held the December CECOT segment over concerns it did not adequately capture the administration’s perspective.
Alfonsi said on Thursday that she attempted to book a Trump administration official at the time, but the administration would not provide anyone for an interview.
“But rather than just running the story, they asked us to change it. I refused,” Alfonsi said. “Not because I’m a pain in the ass, which I am, but because the story was factually correct, and I argued that any change to it might reflect poorly on CBS and 60 Minutes.”
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The segment ultimately aired in January largely unchanged and still without a Trump official on camera.
Then-Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem speaks at El Salvador's CECOT prison on March 26, 2025.Credit: Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty
“I believe I was doing my job, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared. Fear is a funny thing — it can paralyze you, or it can point you to exactly what needs to be protected,” Alfonsi reportedly said on Thursday. “Right now, our industry is afraid of the wrong things. We’re afraid of offending power. We’re afraid of losing access. We’re afraid of another baseless lawsuit.”
“But what we should all be afraid of is silence,” the longtime reporter added.
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Alfonsi said she was so fearful of the dispute with her bosses that her producers offered to hold her hair while she was puking from the stress.
She also told the audience at the National Press Club that someone misled police into sending a SWAT team to her house after the internal dispute at CBS News was reported publicly.
“I guess they were trying to scare me into silence,” she claimed.
Sharyn Alfonsi on Nov. 9, 2022, in Austin, Texas.Credit: Marla Aufmuth/Getty
Thanking the crowd for her award, Alfonsi reportedly said, "I didn't know that the theme was hope. My hope recently has been that I still have a job. And every morning I wake up to another headline that says I've been fired."
“If I am fired, it will not be the first time," she added, according to The Guardian, referencing a waitressing job she lost when she was younger. 60 Minutes begins a new season in September, and unconfirmed reports have emerged that she will not be invited back.
David Ellison, an ally of President Donald Trump, took over CBS News last year after the Justice Department approved the merger between parent company Paramount and Ellison's Skydance. Now, he's seeking the Trump administration's approval to merge with Warner Bros., which would add CNN to his portfolio.
Ahead of the White House Correspondents' Dinner, Ellison reportedly hosted a private dinner in Trump's honor at the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C.
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