Scott Gurvey's Public Offerings

I remember how proud I was the day I reported to work at WBBM-TV, the CBS owned and operated station in Chicago. It was in October 1974. I was to start my first “real,” that is, “post school,” job. My position was “Assistant Political Analyst.” That was a fancy title for an entry level job more commonly known in newsrooms as a “legman.” Legmen, and legwomen, assist senior reporters and columnists as needed. One of the station’s anchors also had the title of “Political Analyst” and I was to help him in everything from researching and producing his stories to doing his expense account and picking up his laundry.

But here I was at bottom of the ladder at the company where Walter Cronkite presided over the evening newscast. The same newscast I had been watching for most of my life. Yes, I felt proud.

I’m not a Pollyanna about this. CBS News was the home of Cronkite. And CBS was the house that Edward R. Murrow built. But it was also the house that drove Murrow out when the going got tough and where one of my journalism teachers, Fred W. Friendly, quit in a huff when management refused to broadcast Senate hearings on the Vietnam War airing instead reruns of I Love Lucy. Later there were legal and ethical problems involving anchorman Dan Rather and the CBS newsmagazine Sixty Minutes.

But CBS News still had the cachet for being as good as it gets for broadcast news. The media world has changed dramatically since my first day on the job, and CBS is no exception. What was once perceived as a left-leaning organization, and a frequent target of conservatives, is now firmly in the hands of Trump supporting Paramount Skydance, controlled by Trump supporting David Ellison. The bloodletting is well under way.

The day-to-day operations of CBS News are now under the control of editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, a new hire in a new position. Paramount Skydance acquired Weiss when it bought her media company, The Free Press, a digital media outlet known for its contrarian and anti-woke stance. Weiss has never worked in broadcasting. She has been an opinion writer, not a news reporter.

In the wake of Ellison’s moves respected Sixty Minutes executive producer Bill Owens and CBS News chief Wendy McMahon both quit, citing corporate meddling in the news division as the reason for their resignations.

The most visible product of this new management to date was a November 2 Sixty Minutes interview of Donald Trump by Nora O’Donnell. Trump had previously sued CBS over an interview during the 2024 election with then Vice President Kamala Harris. The suit had, in the opinion of most, no legal merit. But Paramount settled with Trump for $16 million after the election when the Skydance merger was pending before several Trump administration officials. Trump hadn’t been on CBS for five years.

Sixty Minutes posted the complete Trump interview and transcript of this most recent interview as well as the edited version from the broadcast. In this reporter’s opinion, the editing made Tramp look more coherent and eliminated a considerable amount of his lying about the 2020 elections and his personal attacks on his political opponents.

But most shocking to me was the implication I got at the end when O’Donnell asked Trump for permission to ask another question. She implied here that Trump had been supplied with a list of questions prior to the interview. If true, that would have violated the rules CBS followed during my tenure there. It would also have violated the rules we followed in my twenty-five years at public television’s Nightly Business Report. In my entire career, I have never supplied an interview subject with a list of questions in advance.

That’s not the only surprise in the weeks since Bari Weiss arrived at CBS News.

I personally see Dickerson’s departure as a major loss for CBS. He had a masterful grasp of Washington and was born for the Face the Nation job. He reminds me of Bob Schieffer, who hosted that program for twenty-five years until his retirement. I will be glad to follow Dickerson wherever he goes. Dickerson was pulled from the Face the Nation post in 2018 in favor of Margaret Brennan at the same time Scott Pelley, another first-class newsman, was pulled from the anchor desk of the CBS Evening News in favor of Kelly O’Donnell. I never understood those moves.

Ellison and Weiss have promised to cut costs by cutting 10% of the staff at CBS News. Weiss is reportedly eyeing Pelley, who remains on Sixty Minutes and has been publicly critical of the recent management changes. She has already dumped eight on-air reporters, all of them women, with several being women of color. One of the most controversial dismissals was Debora Patta, a veteran foreign correspondent.

There will be more good people at CBS News who will flee the ship, or will walk the plank, in the weeks to come.

Shed a tear for the CBS eye.

#####