Bari Weiss spiked a major migrant story -- and told on herself

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Bari Weiss spiked a major migrant story — and told on herself
Weiss' catch-and-kill puts her editorial incompetence at CBS News on public view

By Sophia Tesfaye
Senior Writer
Published December 22, 2025 12:10PM (EST)


(Salon) In a single weekend, CBS News’ new editorial director Bari Weiss has managed to damage the most successful and profitable news broadcast in American history. Hours before it was scheduled to air, CBS News abruptly pulled a “60 Minutes” segment on the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), El Salvador’s notorious maximum-security prison, where hundreds of Venezuelan migrants deported by the Trump administration have been held. The decision was announced in a terse statement, with no substantive explanation to viewers. But what is now clear is that the last-minute act of censorship carried out in the name of so-called context suggests Weiss is CBS’s answer to former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker, practicing a “catch and kill” philosophy to protect a petulant tyrant.

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The report detailed the harrowing reality faced by dozens of Venezuelan migrants deported by the Trump administration to a “megaprison” in El Salvador where, according to Human Rights Watch and the University of California, Berkeley’s Investigations Lab, they endured systematic torture and sexual assault. Interviews had been conducted with migrants who have since been released and described brutal conditions. (A federal judge ruled that migrants sent there must be given an opportunity to challenge their removal.)

In a statement issued after the news broke, Weiss suggested the story was “missing critical voices,” insisting on an interview with a White House official, even though the administration already declined. Weiss reportedly gave “60 Minutes” producers White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller’s phone number. According to a recording obtained by the Wall Street Journal, Weiss, in a Monday morning editorial call, told CBS News staffers that the story wasn’t ready for airing and appeared to address the swirling controversy.

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In killing the segment, the new editorial director also reportedly — and revealingly — took issue with the term “migrants” to describe the imprisoned men. Weiss’ brand of enlightened centrism has always been a thin veneer for right-wing reactionary politics. Her objection, it appears, isn’t to the torture, but to the accurate, neutral language that international human rights organizations and U.S. courts routinely use to describe the victims of the Trump administration, which prefers dehumanizing pejoratives like “illegal alien.” This type of anticipatory obedience to the state by media executives is an important marker in the nation’s continuing slide into fascism. And it’s happening at dizzying speed. ................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/12/22/bari-weiss-spiked-a-major-migrant-story-and-told-on-herself/