{"id":856817,"date":"2026-06-10T05:48:24","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T05:48:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/856817\/"},"modified":"2026-06-10T05:48:24","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T05:48:24","slug":"david-ellison-promises-news-independence-seeks-leader-for-cnn-cbs-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/856817\/","title":{"rendered":"David Ellison Promises News Independence, Seeks Leader for CNN-CBS News"},"content":{"rendered":"

David Ellison promised editorial independence for CBS News in a call with \u201c60 Minutes\u201d correspondent Lesley Stahl, hoping to ease fears over Bari Weiss\u2019 troubling tenure leading Paramount\u2019s news division.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Paramount is looking for a new business executive to help lead efforts after the Paramount\/Warner Bros. merger.<\/p>\n

The Paramount CEO made the promise<\/a> in a call to \u201c60 Minutes\u201d correspondent Lesley Stahl. This marks one of the first signs that the chief executive is making moves to appease the escalating turmoil within the network caused by the firing of the program\u2019s leadership and several of its star correspondents. Those fears also come with growing concern for the future of CNN, which would fall under Ellison and Weiss\u2019 purview after the completion of the merger later this year.<\/p>\n

An individual with knowledge of CBS\u2019s thinking told TheWrap \u201cthere is no intention\u201d for Weiss to run the combined news operation. The individual noted that Weiss was \u201cout of the realm of possibility\u201d to lead as early as three weeks ago, before the \u201c60 Minutes\u201d controversy erupted across media platforms.<\/p>\n

Behind the scenes, Paramount leadership is reportedly searching for a new business executive to help Weiss run the conglomerate\u2019s combined news division, which would include both CBS News and CNN. Axios<\/a> reported that meetings with potential hires are under way.<\/p>\n

But there are \u201cnot a lot of candidates\u201d who are qualified to run both networks, this individual said. <\/p>\n

A spokesperson for Paramount declined to comment on the potential executive search, or Weiss\u2019 responsibilities in the combined company.<\/p>\n

\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Lesley\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

Questions about the future of CBS News flared up last week in the aftermath of firings at \u201c60 Minutes\u201d conducted by new executive producer Nick Bilton, a Weiss hire with no prior broadcast journalism experience. The highest-profile exit was that of longtime correspondent Scott Pelley, who was outed from the newsmagazine after a confrontation with Bilton last week at this first staff meeting, where he accused him and Weiss of \u201cmurdering\u201d the news program.<\/p>\n

Stahl, along with remaining \u201c60 Minutes\u201d stars Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim, opted to stay with the program by the end of last week \u2014 promising their decision was more about ensuring the show\u2019s future rather than an endorsement on the changes made by Bilton. Since then questions about Weiss\u2019 future at Paramount continue to swirl, with Ellison maintaining his public confidence Weiss amid the media storm.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Bari\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Ellison promised editorial independence for CBS News in a call with \u201c60 Minutes\u201d correspondent Lesley Stahl, hoping…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":856818,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[30],"tags":[26871,10755,32129,171,15329,173,67,132,68,75614],"class_list":["post-856817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-cbs-news","tag-cnn","tag-david-ellison","tag-entertainment","tag-paramount","tag-tv","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-wrappro"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=856817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/856818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=856817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=856817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=856817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}