Why Scott Pelley Isn't the Hero Everyone Thinks He Is ⏱️
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On Monday morning, social media exploded with news that longtime CBS anchor Scott Pelley was slamming new “60 Minutes” executive producer Nick Bilton — and CBS News big boss Bari Weiss — in an all-hands meeting.
Here’s how the New York Times covered it:
CBS News faced a fresh wave of turmoil on Monday after Scott Pelley, the “60 Minutes” correspondent, laced into the show’s newly hired executive producer during a staff meeting and accused Bari Weiss, the network’s editor in chief, of “murdering” the longstanding Sunday news program.
In an extraordinary exchange, Mr. Pelley, his newscaster’s baritone sometimes shaking in anger, told Nick Bilton, the new executive producer, that he had “slender” qualifications for his new job and questioned the network’s commitment to the future of the program, according to a recording of the meeting obtained by The New York Times.
The reaction among the media class was immediate — and almost entirely unified: Pelley was (and IS) a hero. He was standing up to the attempts by Weiss and Bilton to turn “60 Minutes” and, more broadly, CBS, into an enabling arm of the Trump administration.
X and Instagram were filled with encomiums to Pelley and his “courage.” The narrative was set: Pelley is standing up for capital “J” journalism, which Bilton and Weiss are actively trying to destroy in the name of kissing Donald Trump’s ass.
I think that rush to crown Pelley is not only misguided but TOTALLY misses the real point here.
(Sidebar: Reasonable people can disagree on this! Read my friend Jonathan V. Last on Pelley-gate. He has a totally different take than I do on all of it!)
Let’s dig in.
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Before I make my case, let me offer a few caveats:
I do not know Pelley, Weiss or Bilton. Never met any of them. I know only one person in the management of CBS News — Sophia Efthimiatou — because she used to work at Substack. I truly have no rooting interest here.
I am a giant fan of “60 Minutes.” My parents watched it every Sunday night when I was a kid. Since I got into journalism, my admiration for what they do has only grown.
“60 Minutes” is, by all accounts, a bright spot in the CBS News universe. It’s most recent season averaged more than 9 million viewers — a 9% increase over the previous year. (The question of whether CBS News make money for the broader network is more complicated.)
David Ellison, who owns CBS News and its parent company Paramount, is friendly with President Donald Trump and since Ellison has taken over the network has, at a minimum, moved aggressively to be less openly confrontational with the president.
I am not trying to get a job at CBS. I love my life as an independent journalist. I just re-signed my contributor deal at NewsNation. If CBS offered me a job tomorrow, I can’t — and wouldn’t — take it!
Ok? Ok!
Here’s the thing: I don’t think Pelley is a hero. Nor do I agree with the media people screaming that any attempt to change “60 Minutes” is proof positive that Bilton or Weiss is trying to “murder” the show (as Pelley alleged on Monday).
Let’s start with Pelley, who, again, I don’t know!
He has EVERY right to voice his dissatisfaction with the decision by Weiss to jettison the old executive producer (as well as a decent chunk of the staff) in order to bring in Bilton and a new regime.
But, is an all-hands meeting really the time and place to do it? Especially considering this reporting from CNN’s Brian Stelter:
Seen in the most pro-Pelley light, he chose to confront Bilton and Weiss in an all-hands gathering as a way to make his point as big and brightly as possible. Huddling behind closed doors with the bosses wouldn’t properly convey his upset over the restructuring at “60 Minutes” etc etc.
Seen in a less pro-Pelley light, however, Pelley chose to do his “truth to power” thing not in hopes of actually changing anything but rather as a way to make it as performative as possible — in a content age in which performative emotion is absolute gold.
The immediate leaking of the audio of Pelley’s remarks to literally every media reporter suggests to me that the latter — and admittedly more cynical — explanation has real plausibility.
Because let’s consider how the next few days are likely to go.
Pelley is very likely to get fired by CBS News. I mean, you can’t blast both your immediate boss and your big boss and expect to keep your job. And I would assume Pelley knew that going in! Like, if/when he gets fired, he is not going to be super shocked.
And when he gets fired, Pelley will cut a video announcing he is starting a Substack where he will engage in “fearless” commentary about the capitulation of CBS (and all other media) to Trump and the almighty dollar.
And that Substack will immediately rack up lots and lots of subscribers. And Pelley will make money. Maybe lots of it. (We’ve seen this exact arc play out repeatedly in recent years.)
Two things on that:
Pelley really doesn’t need the money. As far back as 2014, he was making $5 million a year — and demanding a raise!
Pelley is well aware of his earning potential if/when he is cast as yet another media saint martyred by the big bad corporate shills trying to make nice with Donald Trump.
Then there’s the core of Pelley’s criticism of Bilton and Weiss: That they don’t have sufficient “broadcast news” experience to do the job well/right.
“She has no qualifications for her job,” Pelley said of Weiss while telling Bilton: “You have slender qualifications for this job.”
There is NO doubt that neither Weiss nor Bilton have the sort of resumes that the people who have traditionally held these sorts of roles at networks have possessed. They haven’t spent their lives in the world of TV production. And, at times, it’s shown — like when CBS News didn’t get its evening news anchor, Tony Doukopil, a visa to get into China to cover Trump’s visit there.
But there is also NO doubt that broadcast news — and cable TV news — are a dying product. The average age of a CBS News viewer is 62! NBC News is 57. ABC News is a “youthful” 55.
That’s a problem. Because unless science figures out a way to get us all to live until we are 150, the reality is that the main clientele for what CBS News is offering — yes, including “60 Minutes” — is, quite literally, dying off.
Which is why I found myself vigorously nodding my head to the defense Bilton offered on Monday amid the Pelley barrage: “Broadcast is an ice cube that is melting.”
YES. YES. YES.
No one — presumably not even Pelley — thinks that the solution to what ails big media is more of the same. Like, yes, “60 Minutes” still works! But for how long? And doesn’t it make sense to look at your flagship products — whether that’s “60” or the evening news — and say “How are we going to make this product continue to work amid massive disruption in how people want to consume content?”
To me, the answer is very obvious. Which is why Pelley’s criticism — You guys don’t have decades of experience running a broadcast news division!!! — rings false to me.
If I was Ellison — or anyone who owns a legacy media brand — I would want people in the decision-making room who AREN’T old hands at the thing the legacy media brand was built on. Because we know those legacy media content delivery vehicles — linear TV, print newspapers etc. — are dying off. And that no amount of expertise in how to make great-looking broadcast TV shows or put together a whiz-bang front page of the print newspaper is going to reverse the steep decline of people who consume their content that way.
This doesn’t mean, of course, that you throw the baby out with the bathwater. CBS News still needs to make broadcast TV! You can’t get rid of everyone who is an expert in that space!
But, again, the fact that neither Weiss nor Bilton have long experience in making TV seems to me more an asset than a detriment. CBS News (and every other legacy outlet) has to figure out new ways to reach people on new platforms. Why not have people — like Weiss! — who has done that?
Why then was there a rush to tout Pelley as a hero and Bilton and, by extension, Weiss, as the bad guy(s)?
Because I think a whole lot of journalists — mostly tied to legacy media but also some in the independent space — are still clinging to the idea that the way things worked up until 5-10 years ago can still work today and in the future.
They can’t.
Here’s a metaphor a friend in legacy media shared with me about the realities facing ALL of these outlets:
The Titanic has already hit the iceberg. The only question now is how you react to it. Do you:
Pretend that nothing has happened and just keep dancing in your tuxedo
Assess that the boat is damaged but convince yourself that closing off this part of the ship or pumping water out in that section will keep you afloat indefinitely
Recognize that the Titanic is going to sink. And that the only thing to do — in terms of saving any of the people or the stuff on the boat — is to try to build a smaller boat next to the big one so that you can continue to sail in the future.
Most media people seem to me to have chosen option #2. Which makes them feel good because they aren’t pretending that the Titanic hasn’t hit the iceberg! They are simply trying to preserve what made great journalism great!
But to my mind, Option #2, ultimately, ends a whole like Option #1. As in, the boat sinks. And most everyone (and everything) on it goes down. Being more aware that you are sinking but not being willing to take the HARD steps to save what can be saved doesn’t amount to much.
The changes in how people consume content and the sort of content they want to consume is FUNDAMENTAL. It’s never going back to the way it was.
That sort of massive change requires a re-examination of how we do EVERYTHING.
My personal writing hero, Stephen King, said it best in his amazing book “On Writing”: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”
We’ve reached the “kill your darlings” stage of legacy media. The boat has already hit the iceberg. Now the only question is what we do about it. And doing the same old things — or slight variations on the same old things — ain’t going to work.
I think Mr. Pelley's decision stems from the idea that if you are going to fall on your sword, you should attract as much attention as you can first. His decision to do this publicly was a deliberate choice, I suspect. I admire him for it.
But, to use your analogy, neither Weiss not Bilton know anything about ship building or repair. One was a junior building architect who, even more performatively, left their firm after live tweeting a meeting and then being unable to get along with her coworkers, while Bilton worked for the same architecture firm doing detailing work. Neither has any new ideas about how to fix the ship, nor does David Ellison, who made his money via accident of birth