UPDATE: The Fight for 60 Minutes: They're Staying
Lesley Stahl, Bill Whitaker, and Jon Wertheim say they're staying.
The rebellion inside 60 Minutes isn’t over.
Three of the program’s remaining correspondents — Lesley Stahl, Bill Whitaker, and Jon Wertheim — have announced they’re staying.
But before anyone at CBS News mistakes that for a vote of confidence, they should keep reading.
The trio issued a statement Friday explaining their decision. They described themselves as grieving. They said the program has been wounded and damaged. They condemned the treatment of colleagues who were pushed out. And they made clear that remaining at 60 Minutes should not be interpreted as support for the people now running it.
Instead, they say they’re staying for one reason. To fight.
“We don’t want to see 60 Minutes die,” they wrote. “We want to stay and fight.”
In most newsroom shakeups, employees either leave in protest or stay silent and keep their heads down. Veteran correspondents don’t usually issue public declarations that essentially amount to: We’re remaining because we’re afraid management might destroy the institution if nobody is left to defend it.
Just days ago, CBS News fired Sharyn Alfonsi, Cecilia Vega, executive producer Tanya Simon, executive editor Draggan Mihailovich, and other senior staff members during what employees have come to call “Black Thursday.” Then came the firing of Scott Pelley after his confrontation with new executive producer Nick Bilton.
That left a lot of observers wondering whether Stahl and Whitaker would be next out the door.
Instead, they’ve chosen a different path.
The statement also suggests something else. Despite the corporate messaging coming from CBS News leadership, the people who built 60 Minutes still view this as a fight over the identity of the broadcast itself. They’re arguing about editorial independence, newsroom culture, and whether the values that made 60 Minutes successful for nearly six decades will survive the current management team.
The people who remain are now carrying the entire legacy of the program on their shoulders.
And they just told CBS News management, in public, that they’re not prepared to hand it over quietly.
Read their full note below.
