60 Minutes Staff Stunned Silent by Question from CBS New News Editor-In-Chief Bari Weiss

CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss reportedly stunned the 60 Minutes team during a private staff meeting this week by asking a question that left veteran journalists momentarily speechless.

According to The New York Times, Weiss asked the group, “Why does the country think you’re biased?” during a Tuesday meeting at CBS headquarters.

The question, described by attendees as direct and unexpected, prompted what multiple sources called an awkward silence from the show’s reporters and producers.

Weiss, 41, who describes herself as a centrist and has made political neutrality central to her plans for CBS News, raised the question as part of a broader discussion about restoring public trust in mainstream media.

Three people familiar with the meeting told The Times that the exchange caught many of the network’s most established figures off guard.

Among those present were 60 Minutes correspondents Anderson Cooper and Lesley Stahl, both of whom were described as taken aback by the suggestion that their reporting may be perceived as partisan.

The @nytimes thinks it is provocative for @bariweiss to ask the @60Minutes team a simple question: “Why does the country think you’re biased?” The obvious inquiry was met with stunned awkwardness.https://t.co/8ZMVNUOLk2 pic.twitter.com/uYXrXYaPzt

— Scott Rasmussen (@ScottWRasmussen) October 19, 2025

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Cooper, who also anchors on CNN, and Stahl have long maintained that their work is fact-based and objective.

Just remember, Anderson Cooper sat in a puddle to make his viewers believe he was in a flood zone. pic.twitter.com/ktuPadDAou

— Donna Nana (@NanaWildflowers) October 10, 2024

The meeting followed Weiss’s first two weeks as editor-in-chief, a position she officially assumed on October 6.

Her appointment marked a significant change in leadership at CBS News, coming amid efforts by parent company Paramount Skydance to rebrand and stabilize the network after a turbulent year.

Weiss previously worked as an opinion editor at The New York Times before resigning in 2020, citing what she called an “illiberal environment.”

She later co-founded The Free Press, an independent media outlet that Paramount Skydance is now in the process of acquiring.

Her hiring by Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison, the son of billionaire and Trump ally Larry Ellison, drew attention both inside and outside the network.

An insider told the Daily Mail that Weiss had been “informally consulting” for CBS before her official start date.

In her new role, Weiss has pledged to refocus CBS News toward what she calls “the American mainstream,” saying that much of the public has been “ill-served” by politically polarized media coverage.

CBS News has faced repeated criticism over its editorial direction in recent years, particularly in the wake of controversies involving 60 Minutes.

In October 2024, former President Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against the network, alleging that a segment featuring then–Vice President Kamala Harris was deceptively edited.

Remember Kamala’s word salad answer about Israel on 60 Minutes? It’s gone.

This is what many Americans will now see. pic.twitter.com/H4w7btDv6x

— MAZE (@mazemoore) October 8, 2024

Paramount settled the case for $16 million, which sources said helped clear the way for the federal approval of an $8 billion merger between Skydance Media and Paramount in August 2025.

The network also faced backlash earlier this year over its coverage of the Israel-Gaza conflict.

Lesley Stahl was widely criticized for an April interview with former Hamas hostage Keith Siegel, in which she asked whether his captors had starved him “on purpose or if they just did not have any food to hand out.”

Siegel, who was held for 484 days, replied, “No, I think they starved me, and they would often eat in front of me and not offer me food.”

The interview drew condemnation from media critics and members of Congress, who accused Stahl of showing undue sympathy toward Hamas.

In the weeks following the controversy, 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens and CBS News CEO Wendy McMahon both resigned amid reported disagreements over the network’s editorial direction.

Despite his long-standing disputes with CBS, President Donald Trump recently told CNN he believes Weiss and Ellison will steer the network toward greater balance.

“CBS has great potential,” Trump said.

As Weiss begins restructuring CBS News, her pointed question to the 60 Minutes team has fueled renewed debate within the network about how to address perceptions of political bias while retaining journalistic credibility.