CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is eyeing Fox News anchor Bret Baier – among others – to potentially helm the CBS Evening News, according to sources inside the network.
Weiss, who took charge shortly after media mogul David Ellison’s acquisition of CBS, has been working to reconfigure day-to-day operations at the network, reportedly ordering staff to submit detailed memos outlining their roles ahead of expected layoffs and personally intervened in the network’s booking process, calling guests and weighing in on coverage priorities – which include a spot for her sister, Free Press co-founder Suzy Weiss.
As part of her recalibrations, the new editor-in-chief has been “quietly canvassing” for a fresh face to anchor the flagship show, and, among external candidates, Weiss has floated Baier as a potential candidate, sources revealed to Status’ Oliver Darcy.
While internal names like Norah O’Donnell and Tony Dokoupil remain on the table, Weiss has reportedly spoken with several colleagues about bringing the Fox mainstay into the CBS fold in a move that Darcy argued “signals where the network is headed under Ellison
A CBS spokesperson declined to comment to Status, as did Fox News.
Baier, who earns roughly $14 million a year and has long been considered Fox News’s most polished Beltway anchor, extended his contract in 2023 through 2028, Darcy pointed out, making an immediate move improbable.
Weiss’s pursuit of the Fox News anchor is not the first time she’s tried to secure the services of someone already under contract with Fox, in her early days as CBS News boss. The newly-minted EIC tried to get former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo — a Fox News contributor under contract — to appear on a recent panel with other former Secretaries of State, despite Pompeo’s exclusivity to Fox. That effort failed, and the panel discussion proceeded without him.