Bari Weiss has once again defended her decision to pull a 60 Minutes story on the Trump administration’s deportation of migrants to a prison in El Salvador.
Weiss sent a note to staff on Christmas Eve addressing the controversial decision. She said that the majority of Americans say they do not “trust the press”.
“It isn’t because they’re crazy. To win back their trust, we have to work hard. Sometimes that means doing more legwork. Sometimes it means telling unexpected stories. Sometimes it means training our attention on topics that have been overlooked or misconstrued. And sometimes it means holding a piece about an important subject to make sure it is comprehensive and fair,” she wrote.
She added that in “our upside-down moment, this may seem radical”.
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“Such editorial decisions can cause a firestorm, particularly on a slow news week. And the standards for fairness we are holding ourselves to, particularly on contentious subjects, will surely feel controversial to those used to doing things one way. But to fulfill our mission, it’s necessary. No amount of outrage—whether from activist organizations or the White House—will derail us. We are not out to score points with one side of the political spectrum or to win followers on social media. We are out to inform the American public and to get the story right. Restoring the integrity of the news is a difficult task. We can’t think of a more important one,” she continued.
The message was signed by Weiss, who is Editor-in-Chief of CBS News, Tom Cibrowski, who is President and Executive Editor and editors Charles Forelle and Adam Rubenstein.
It comes two days after Weiss told colleagues that she decided to hold the piece because it was “not ready” and it did not advance the story.
That decision was criticized by Sharyn Alfonsi, the correspondent who worked on the story, who called it a “political” one.
The piece featured interviews with Venezuelan deportees who were sent by Trump’s administration to the harsh CECOT prison in El Salvador.
Some viewers have already got a chance to watch the segment, after it leaked online. Canadian broadcaster Global TV, which airs 60 Minutes north of the border, had featured the piece on its app before it was pulled.
Weiss ended the memo by wishing her staff a Merry Christmas. “Thank you, especially, to everyone who is working over this holiday,” she concluded.