Bari Weiss’ Free Press will join CBS News as editor and his new upstart site The free press will be part of the Skydance media.
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Noam Galai / Getty Images For Images Free Press / Getty North America
CBS News plans to make another step to call on center rights viewers by installing Bari Weiss as editor. The new CBS business owner, Skydance Media, also acquires the Free Press site, the views and news from Weiss.
Weiss will arrive with a mandate to redefine the CBS News brand in the eyes of the public and refine its media coverage. She is considered an agent of change for a network regularly accused by President Trump and his political allies as a liberal bias.
Weiss founded the free press after a granted resignation from The New York Timeswhere she accused her colleagues of intolerance. It has no experience in broadcasting and seems unlikely to execute the news division of CBS on a daily basis given the logistical requirements of television information. The current president and editor -in -chief, Tom Cibrowski, a leader of the veteran broadcast, remains. The two will be presented in the editorial room as partners.
NPR interviewed eight current and former journalists of CBS News for this story. Several still on the network – speaking under the cover of anonymity because the network has not authorized them to speak publicly – affirms that they retain a judgment until they see if Weiss offers information and advice or begins to issue decrees with an ideological intention.
Weiss’ work will however be complicated by the intention of the company to carry out dismissals at the network level this month up to 10% of the workforce, according to two people with direct knowledge. They spoke under the guise of anonymity because they were not allowed to speak publicly about the issue.
While the president of the news division is the holder chief, CBS News has a tradition of strong and independent executive producers who date back to the collaborator of Edward Murrow Fred Friendly and 60 minutes Creator Don Hewitt.
Weiss is considered to be net, informed and entrepreneurial. She had been editor -in -chief of opinion and books of books to THE Wall Street Journal Before joining the New York Times’ Opinion section, where she also wrote under her own signature, often taking a opposite. When she left this newspaper in July 2020, that – like many editorial rooms – was struggling with tensions on social justice. She denounced her former colleagues in a publicly published letter to Times President and publisher AG Sulzberger, saying they intimidated it and created what she said was an “illiberal environment”. At the time, the Times replied by affirming a commitment to the honest dialogue and mutual respect for colleagues.
The free press focused on what it supports is a culture that afflicts institutions that affected higher education and popular culture. He splashes last year by publishing a critical test on NPR by Uri Berliner, then editor-in-chief of the Affairs of the Public Media Network, and criticisms of the way in which traditional press organizations cover the War of Israel-Hamas.
While attracting the support of many of those who accuse the consumer media of being liberal by reflex, the site does not blindly adopt the Trump agenda. When the best dissemination regulator of the country, the president of the Federal Commission for Communications Brendan Carr, ABC put pressure on “act” on Jimmy KimmelThe Free Press cried a fault for the first amendment.
As part of the new plan, Weiss will continue to execute the Free Press as a new and autonomous view site, maintaining its own brand and subscription model. External analysts say that the acquisition figure seems high, but reflects the value that the CEO of Skydance Media, David Ellison and his Multi -loving father, Larry Ellison places on Weiss and his information site.
Since Skydance bought the parent company of CBS Paramount in July, David Ellison said that the The network is friendly with conservative views. His father, who is the main player in Skydance and The Paramount Deal, is the founder of Oracle and a supporter of Trump vocal.
However, this purchase was retained for months as a former owner of CBS negotiated a regulation of $ 16 million With Trump. Just before last year’s elections, Trump continued CBS alleging that a 60 minutes The interview with the Democratic candidate for the presidential election Kamala Harris had been published in an effort to make her appear more articulated than it was.
Many legal experts had envisaged the Frilous and CBS trial likely to triumph before the court. However, Carr launched an official CBS FCC review which has strengthened Trump’s complaint, increasing pressure on the network and its owners.
Before regulation, Cibrowski The predecessor Wendy McMahon resignedLike Bill Owens, the longtime executive producer network signature show, 60 minutes. In a note to the staff, Owens said that he was no longer allowed to “make independent decisions according to what was good for 60 minutes, just for the public”.
Before finishing the purchase, David Ellison signed up for the CARR of the FCC to reshape Paramount, CBS and CBS News. Skydance then hired Kenneth Weinstein, the former president and chief executive officer of the Hudson Institute, a conservative reflection group, as Assumdsman of CBS News to present complaints concerning media coverage.
By approving the sale, the FCC said that Skydance had made written commitments to “eliminate the bias which has undermined confidence in the national media” and “ensure that the programming of the new society embodies a diversity of views of the whole political and ideological spectrum”.
Ellison may not have finished expanding the Skydance journalism portfolio. He is Apparently prepare an offer For Warner Brothers Discovery, who owns the giant of the CNN cable news.
