‘They Don’t Understand’: New Details Emerge from Stunning Closed Door ’60 Minutes’ Skirmish

(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

Veteran anchor Scott Pelley’s diatribe against new management at a 60 Minutes staff meeting spread like wildfire Monday, after recordings of the event were obtained by multiple news outlets.

New 60 Minutes executive producer Nick Bilton’s first meeting with staff had only just begun, when Pelley, the former anchor of CBS Evening News and longtime correspondent at 60 Minutes, interrupted the proceedings. Bilton, reading from prepared notes, had just claimed that CBS editor Bari Weiss “loves 60 Minutes.”

“She’s murdering ’60 Minutes.’ She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it—and she’s doing exactly that,” interjected Pelley — according to multiple reports. “She has no qualifications for her job; you have slender qualifications for this job. The changes that she’s made at the ‘Evening News’ have been catastrophic, so why should we expect that any of this is going to be any better?”

A source with knowledge of the situation told Mediaite that one of the reasons new 60 Minutes executive producer Nick Bilton lost the room was due to his boast that he had multiple story ideas he wanted to run with — a move which deviated from standard practice at the newsmagazine dating back to the show’s original executive producer Don Hewitt.

60 Minutes isn’t a top down organization, the source told Mediaite. Hewitt didn’t give story ideas ahead of time. A team does that, meaning that Bilton’s assertion signaled a fundamental misunderstanding of the show’s structure. The claim triggered gasps from the room. The source likened the dynamic to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory — as though someone walked into the factory and told Willy Wonka they knew how to make chocolate.

The source did tell Mediaite they do believe it’s Bilton and Weiss’s intention to “save” 60 Minutes, but noted they didn’t offer much indication that they have the ability to do it.

“They’re going try to save it,” the source told Mediaite. “But if you’re going to try to save it you have to know whats good about it and they [60 Minutes staff] don’t think they understand what’s good about it and that’s storytelling.”

While networks or daily news might be, as Bilton characterized it in the meeting, “an ice cube that is melting,” storytelling and those who tell stories are not. The feeling in the room was of an outsider invading the 60 Minutes space and tearing it apart, while all the while acting as though they were going to make it better.

Speculation about why Weiss wasn’t present at the meeting was addressed by a staffer whose job involved aiding Bilton in the transition to his new role. The staffer claimed that she was to blame for editor-in-chief’s absence.

The prevailing anger in the room, according to the source, included frustration over the continued references to 60 Minutes as a “brand,” as if it was some sort of commodified product rather than the result of journalistic enterprise. In fact, both Weiss and Bilton referred to the show’s “brand” in their announcement of the EP’s new role.

“Nick is one of the most entrepreneurial journalists of our time and the perfect leader for one of the most entrepreneurial news brands of all time,” Weiss said of her new hire.

“60 Minutes is, without exaggeration, the most important television journalism brand this country has ever produced,” wrote Bilton in his introductory letter to staff.

Bilton has been quick to reference Hewitt in interviews since his hiring, but didn’t seem, according to the insiders, to pay much heed to Hewitt’s famous mantra “Tell me a story.” Pelley underlined this point in the meeting, calling out Bilton for his invocation of the show’s legendary EP.

“Did you at any point work with Don Hewitt, telling everybody about what Don Hewitt thought, and what his inspiration was?” Status’ Oliver Darcy reported Pelley asking. “I worked for Don Hewitt from 1999 to 2004 and Lesley Stahl probably worked with him for thirty years. Just wondering how you have such deep insight?”

If there was any doubt that Bilton knew the feelings of the room, the source with knowledge told Mediaite that the cheers that reportedly erupted after the meeting did so very soon after the new EP departed, when he was decidedly still within earshot.

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