It’s Kinda Hilarious to See Scott Pelley Expose Himself as Such a Doofus

It’s impossible for me to get worked up about Scott Pelley’s firing, or about the whining tour he is taking himself on. 

Pelley has always been a pompous ass, and it doesn’t speak well of liberals that he seems to be just the sort of person who appeals to them as authoritative. He is sort of a John Kerry with less charm. 

After writing about him in my Sunday Smiles essay, I thought I would be done with Pelley, but after seeing more clips from his unintentionally hilarious interview/podcast with Lulu Garcia-Navarro of The New York Times, I couldn’t resist a few more jabs at this self-absorbed midwit who thinks that his reporting is equivalent to serving his country in combat. 

I haven’t really paid much attention to Garcia-Navarro, but this is the second interview in which she managed to help expose her guest’s hypocrisy, and I have to say I appreciate her talent for it. For all I know, she is a raging leftist who would drive me crazy, but I humbly admit that I am quite impressed by the few clips I have seen of her. 

She absolutely eviscerated Tucker Carlson, not by doing the typical “journalist” thing of arguing with her guest; she let Tucker speak, and he used the rope she gave him to hang himself. 

She did the same with Pelley. It was a masterclass. Seriously, I am impressed. I wish I had that skill. 

What inspired me to write about the podcast again was this clip:

The arrogance of this guy…

Lulu Garcia-Navarro: “But, Scott, in a meeting, you accused Bari Weiss, the head of the network of wanting to murder the show, of coming into 60 Minutes with the agenda to dismantle the institution. And you did not think that that was going to have… pic.twitter.com/ZCiPXY1cyW

— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) June 7, 2026

The arrogance of this guy…

Lulu Garcia-Navarro: “But, Scott, in a meeting, you accused Bari Weiss, the head of the network of wanting to murder the show, of coming into 60 Minutes with the agenda to dismantle the institution. And you did not think that that was going to have repercussions that could lead to your firing?”

Pelley: “We used to be able to have conversations like that at CBS News. The difference today is that the people running CBS News will not be questioned.”

Masterclass, I tell you. What Garcia-Navarro did there without a hint of bellicosity is expose Pelley’s cluelessness. Every person who has ever been a subordinate in a workplace knows that there are limits to what you can say or do without getting fired, and attacking your boss in that manner clearly crosses that line. 

“Bari Weiss asked 60 Minutes to accurately report the news.” https://t.co/IOLjag60PM

— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) June 8, 2026

Only a person who believes they are indispensable thinks they can get away with that, because it is an attempt to invert the lines of authority and destroy one’s boss, which is clearly what Pelley was doing. The fact that it was not Weiss who fired him in a fit of rage, but the President of the network itself who fired him, showed  that he knew that and wouldn’t tolerate it. 

Former CBS correspondent Scott Pelley says he did not expect to be fired after his confrontation with new management. “Oh gosh, furthest thing from my mind. It hadn’t occurred to me…I just didn’t connect the dots.” From NYT: https://t.co/8AcHIH4QpG

— Byron York (@ByronYork) June 7, 2026

It is little different than telling your boss, “It’s you or me.” Buddy, expect it to be you, especially since Bari Weiss was brought in to clean up a mess. 

During his interview, Pelley revealed that he didn’t realize that Americans think the news is biased, despite years of declining trust in the media. He literally believes there is no evidence that Americans think that journalists are biased. 

Scott Pelley being shocked that Bari Weiss brought up that 60 Minutes is perceived as biased is exactly why trust in legacy media has cratered

They’re so deeply buried in the left wing bubble they actually believe they’re objective pic.twitter.com/ISAz97Tmee

— Ian Miller (@ianmSC) June 7, 2026

Where’s the evidence, Bari? Isn’t that just a MAGA talking point?!

Scott Pelley pretends the public doesn’t believe the media is biased. Does Pelley have an internet connection? https://t.co/w3kG6OWxaP pic.twitter.com/gVS00bPaAx

— Paul D. Thacker (@thackerpd) June 7, 2026

Trust in media is at an all-time low, and ace journalist Pelley finds the assertion absurd. Everybody knows that 60 Minutes and CBS News are straight down the middle, and patriotic as you can get. Even more patriotic than the soldiers he covered!

Scott Pelley fires back at President Trump during @NYTimes podcast with @LuluGNavarro. Pelley: “I’ve never worn the uniform, but I’ve been in combat for this country.” Citing his experience covering combat: “I’m not aware that the President of the United States has ever done any… pic.twitter.com/rNQMF5ACVv

— Brent Baker 🇺🇲🇺🇦 🇮🇱 (@BrentHBaker) June 7, 2026

Scott Pelley fires back at President Trump during @NYTimes podcast with @LuluGNavarro. Pelley: “I’ve never worn the uniform, but I’ve been in combat for this country.” Citing his experience covering combat: “I’m not aware that the President of the United States has ever done any of those things for his country.” Pelley, getting emotional: “‘Stupid.’ I can take that. ‘Stiff,’ yeah, probably. ‘Don’t care about the country.’ I’ve never worn the uniform, but I’ve been in combat for this country. In Afghanistan and Iraq, Kuwait. Been shot at. Spent nights in foxholes filling up with water in the desert. I’m not aware that the President of the United States has ever done any of those things for his country….You become a journalist because you love the country….There is no democracy without journalism. It can’t be done. And that is why I am a journalist.”

I can’t get into Garcia-Navarro’s mind. Perhaps underneath that deadpan approach, she agrees with Pelley, but whether that is true or not, her deadpan approach works far better in eliciting revealing interviews than any of the Sunday show hosts. She got both Pelley and Tucker Carlson to expose themselves in a way that a person with a more adversarial approach simply could not. 

“And there’s a subtle political bias that I have never seen at ‘60 Minutes” before or at CBS News before.”

Scott Pelley spews nonsense with confidence. He has so thoroughly imbibed progressive dogmas that he may actually believe he is politically neutral.. pic.twitter.com/H4WHSZ4WGP

— Mike (@Doranimated) June 7, 2026

That first clip from above tells me everything I need to know about Pelley, even if I  knew nothing else about him. He reveals himself to be an arrogant prig with whom no boss could work successfully, especially one charged with making changes that are uncomfortable to employees. The man refused to work with his bosses, insulted them, and preened that he was better than they were. 

Lulu Garcia-Navarro: “But it really didn’t occur to you that you could be fired after so many of your colleagues had been let go after you’d had this, you know, very contentious interaction with your new boss?”

Scott Pelley: “You know, some reporter, I turned out to be. I just… pic.twitter.com/rDtKTzJMgY

— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) June 7, 2026

Lulu Garcia-Navarro: “But it really didn’t occur to you that you could be fired after so many of your colleagues had been let go after you’d had this, you know, very contentious interaction with your new boss?” 

Scott Pelley: “You know, some reporter, I turned out to be. I just didn’t connect the dots. I mean, was this meeting contentious? Yes, but 60 Minutes is known for two things, a ticking stopwatch and hard questions. And we ask ourselves those hard questions in the shop because they sharpen us and make us better. There was a screening once with Mike Wallace and Mike and the executive producer and founder of 60 Minutes, Don Hewitt, got into a big argument about a script. Wallace jumps up in the middle of the screening, throws his script up in the air and yells at Don. Well, then you write the f’ing thing. One of those pieces of paper comes down and slices an associate producer across the face. He’s bleeding now. He’s got a paper cut on his face. That was about a story. The meeting that I was in was about whether 60 Minutes was going to even survive or not.”

Garcia-Navarro: “So, you walk in, and what was the energy of the room?”

Pelley: “Hostile, dismissive before I could take my seat. Tom Cibrowski said, this is a firing offense. I was confused. I wasn’t sure who he was talking about in the room, but it became plain very quickly that they were talking about me, and they were unhappy about the meeting that had occurred, a meeting that had ended in thunderous applause for me, if I may say so, because somebody had stood up for the broadcast.”

Of course he got fired. Anybody in a similar position would have, regardless of anything else. 

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