White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller called on CBS to remove any staffers involved in a “revolt” over the network’s decision to pull a 60 Minutes segment on the treatment of migrants in El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison.
Miller was reacting to the move by controversial CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, who The Independent reported could be facing a “revolt” from staff at 60 Minutes over her last-minute decision to pull the story about the Trump administration’s mass deportations.
The investigative news program was due to air the upcoming piece Sunday, entitled “Inside CECOT” about the notorious El Salvador prison, where journalist Sharyn Alfonsi interviewed inmates about the abuse they say they had suffered within its walls.
“Every one of those producers at 60 Minutes engaged in this revolt — clean house and fire them, that's what I say,” Miller raged Tuesday evening on Fox News.
He complained about “these 60 Minutes producers who are living in comfort and security in their west end condos trying to make us feel sympathetic for these monsters” in his rant to host Charlie Hurt.
Weiss said she pulled the segment because “we do not present the administration’s argument” for sending Venezuelans to CECOT, and requested “numerous changes,” including a suggestion that it feature a new interview with Miller, according to The New York Times.
Miller said that he didn’t “remember getting anything” when Hurt asked whether he was “contacted about this package.”
“I don't remember anybody reaching out to me. As you know, people put things into comms inboxes and general feedback comments,” Miller said, before pivoting. “But more fundamentally, this is another pathetic 60 Minutes hatchet job.”
In an email to 60 Minutes staff, journalist Alfonsi said that she and her team “requested responses to questions and/or interviews with DHS, the White House and the State Department” but received no response.
“Government silence is a statement, not a veto. Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story,” Alfonsi said.
“If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient,” she continued.
Sources told The Independent that Weiss arranged a “big managers' crisis meeting” in CBS News' New York offices to address the fallout from spiking the CECOT story. According to sources familiar with the meeting, Weiss spent much of the time assuring attendees that the segment was not dead and would eventually air on 60 Minutes.
The segment was leaked online this week after a recording aired on Canada’s Global Television Network. The story appears to have been taken down, but it is still on a website that captures and preserves webpages after they are removed.
Numerous deportees in the leaked video report torture, beatings and abuse. One Venezuelan deportee featured in the leaked video reported being punished with sexual abuse and solitary confinement.
Another deportee said guards beat him and broke his bones as soon as he arrived.
“When you get there, you already know you're in hell. You don't need anyone to tell you,” he said.
The story featured numerous experts who called into question the legal basis for deporting migrants so hastily amidst pending judicial decisions.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
