More Than Migrants: The True Reason Why Bari Weiss Scrapped the CECOT 60 Minutes Segment
We officially have American state media in this country.
This past week's debacle at CBS News shouldn't surprise anyone who was paying attention. After all, we've seen the network lurch to the right over the past year, due largely to the August acquisition via David Ellison, the billionaire son of Larry Ellison and a longtime public Trump supporter. But even before this deal with the devil, CBS was already bending the knee to the Trump Administration, as evidenced by their July $16 million settlement for what Trump claimed was selective editing of the network's October 2024 interview of Democratic Party nominee Kamala Harris. While CBS publicly denied selectively editing the interview, they chose to settle rather than fight the lawsuit, seen largely at the time as a goodwill gesture to Trump when there were ongoing negotiations for the potential merger. Getting on Trump's good side was seen as a key bargaining strategy, and it was no coincidence that less than a month after the settlement, the deal went through. The Ellison family had bribed their way to purchasing one of the Big Three networks, something they had long sought to do and could only do with a cretin like Donald Trump in the White House.
David Ellison quickly went to work undermining the news division. Ripping a page from the Succession playbook, he immediately put in charge Bari Weiss, a former New York Times opinion editor who became popular in conservative circles after resigning and trashing her former workplace. Weiss had no experience running a news division, but that didn't matter. What she could do was be a good German, and help the network alter its coverage of the Trump Administration. While her first two months were seemingly drama-free, that all changed this past week when Weiss pulled a story on a notorious El Salvadoran prison where Trump had sent Venezuelan migrants mere hours before it was set to air on 60 Minutes. Weiss cited a need for additional sourcing before air, but that explanation was quickly thrown out the window when CBS correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi, who reported the episode, shared that she and her team went through all the legal and proper channels necessary. Weiss later pivoted and said that the story offered nothing new, yet having two witnesses publicly share their stories was something that no news network had done since these individuals were released back to Venezuela in July. Alfonsi correctly stated that this had all the makings of a political rather than an editorial decision.
A political decision handed down to Weiss, likely by David Ellison. Because once again, the Ellison family is trying to get back into Trump's good graces, this time to purchase Warner Bros., in what is quickly becoming a bidding war between Ellison's Paramount and rival Netflix. Ellison has made no secret about his desire to purchase the parent company of CNN, and Donald Trump has also expressed a willingness to receive more favorable news coverage from the network, and has gone so far as to say that any deal must include a new owner for CNN. Not wanting to get on their master's bad side, it should become apparent that David Ellison's and Bari Weiss' decision to scrap the El Salvadoran prison story was done to keep from upsetting their exalted orange overlord. Because, heaven forbid, CBS News reports actual news in a way that slightly upsets the sitting president of the United States.
That's where we stand. What was once Walter Cronkite's network is now axing news segments to curry favor with the most corrupt president in American history. Bari Weiss is not blameless; she is doing exactly what she was hired to do. But this issue goes beyond her. This is an issue that rips apart the very foundation of our country. We've always had a free and independent press. It's what separates us from authoritarian regimes. It's why our journalists don't get window cancer like they do in Russia. It's why LL and I can post what we do in the way in which we do it. Yet what we're seeing with the Ellison family is something new. Never before have we had powerful billionaires so close to the Oval Office. Never before have we had powerful billionaires being so open in their intentions. And never before have we had an American president so weak that he succumbs to flattery so easily and sees no choice but to help whoever praised him a mere five minutes ago.
We're living in dangerous times. Our media is not only sane-washing Trump, but they're now openly censoring stories that make him look bad. But our saving grace, as always, is the fact that Trump and his allies are godawfully stupid. And when Bari Weiss axes a story on 60 Minutes and forgets to do so with the Canadian broadcast, we can't help but laugh. Because now not only is the story the report itself, but also how and why CBS News is censoring itself at the behest of Donald Trump and David Ellison. More and more of us are making the connection about the Ellison family and their desire to take over CNN. Of course, Trump has never been good about hiding his intentions, and he will continue blabbing about the proposed takeover. All the while, more and more casual news followers learn about the CECOT prison for the first time, and become aware that the Trump Administration sent over 250 mostly non-violent Venezuelans to El Salvador to be tortured. None of this would have been on most folks' radar had 60 Minutes simply run the segment at its regularly scheduled timeslot. By killing the story in the way in which she did, Bari Weiss has drawn much unwanted attention at a time when Larry and David Ellison wanted to do everything possible to stay in Trump's good graces.
A Christmas miracle if ever there was one.