![\"Jon](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1788602900_539_.jpeg\")
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Jon Wertheim interviews Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay.<\/p>\n
(CBS News)<\/p>\n
\u201c60 Minutes\u201d has often turned to sports-related segments when a season premiere follows a late afternoon NFL game. Last year, Wertheim profiled Ultimate Fighting Championship Chief Executive Dana White for the 58th season premiere. The program scored more than 10 million viewers and was the most-watched non-sports program of the week. In 2023, Wertheim interviewed University of Colorado head football coach Deion Sanders for the 56th season opener.<\/p>\n
CBS News will be under pressure to have \u201c60 Minutes\u201d get off to a strong start in the ratings following the major upheaval at the program earlier this year.<\/p>\n
After the completion of a successful season where ratings were up 9% over the previous year, Weiss fired \u201c60 Minutes\u201d correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi <\/a>and Cecilia Vega<\/a> \u2014 both of whom complained that the executive pushed them to add right-wing talking points to their stories. Weiss also dismissed \u201c60 Minutes\u201d executive producer Tanya Simon and replaced her with screenwriter and documentary filmmaker Nick Bilton, who has no previous experience in TV news.<\/p>\n In response to the firings, longtime correspondent Scott Pelley accused Weiss of \u201cmurdering\u201d the program and claimed she was putting \u201cher thumb on the scale\u201d for more favorable coverage of President Trump\u2019s administration. Pelley was shown the door with cause after confronting management at a June 1 meeting. CBS denied the claims.<\/p>\n The discord meant the program spent much of the summer hiring replacement correspondents, including Ross Douthat<\/a>, a conservative New York Times opinion writer with no experience as a TV journalist.<\/p>\n Weiss, founder of the heterodox digital news site the Free Press, was hired by Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison with a mandate to pull the news division to the political center. The stated goal has put every move by Weiss under heavy scrutiny, as many critics have suggested she is at the network to placate the Trump White House while Paramount pursues its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.<\/p>\n Other new \u201c60 Minutes\u201d contributors include author and journalist Sebastian Junger, former CNN and Vice News correspondent Gianna Toboni, and Trevor Phillips, a British journalist who joined CBS News earlier this year as a senior global affairs correspondent. They will join correspondents Wertheim, Norah O\u2019Donnell, Bill Whitaker and Lesley Stahl.<\/p>\n