Stormy Time for Media Matters

by

Article in Status by Oliver Darcy, 6/8/26

Headline::  “Media Matters’ Musk Mayhem”

Subhead:  “The progressive media watchdog has been forced to undergo layoffs and take other cost-cutting measures as it continues to battle the “dark MAGA” billionaire in a costly legal war, Status has learned.”

“In March of this year, an uncomfortable reality dawned on Angelo Carusone, the president of Media Matters, and the non-profit’s leadership team. As he examined the progressive media watchdog’s finances, which had come under enormous strain over the last year amid a costly legal war waged by Elon Musk, Carusone concluded that he would need to make some difficult cuts to the organization. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/media-matters-elon-musk-lawsuit-layoffs

Will Ellison Leash Weiss?

by


Article in The Wrap by Sharon Waxman, 6/8/26

Headline:  “Bari Weiss Has Become a Liability for David Ellison at CBS News – Will He Make a Move? | Analysis”

Subhead:  “It turns out that her immaturity, disorganization and inability to learn from mistakes have been even more damaging than her lack of experience”

“It was an apocalyptic week in the world of media, where the polite veneer at CBS News was ripped away to reveal fear, loathing, betrayal and ultimately the murder of the most respected newsmagazine on television, ’60 Minutes,’ by Editor in Chief Bari Weiss.

Weiss’s name was everywhere on social media all weekend, with overwhelmingly negative backlash to her decision to fire Scott Pelley last week after firing the senior leadership days before that. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thewrap.com/media-platforms/tv/will-david-ellison-fire-bari-weiss-cbs-news/

– – – – –

Article in The Nation by Jon Walsh, 6/8/26

Headline:  “Fire Bari Weiss!”

Subhead:  “Which is worse, her political malevolence or her incompetence?”

“After CBS News 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley was fired by Bari Weiss’s incompetent henchman Nick Bilton last week, the network veteran went public with his complaints about Weiss’s politically motivated mismanagement of the show. One of his most noteworthy complaints was that she pushed the correspondents to add distortions and lies to some of their segments. Media critics asked that Pelley be more specific, and on Sunday, with The New York Times, he was. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/scott-pelley-60-minutes-cbs-news/

Media Defiance

by


Article in AlterNet by Thom Hartman, 6/7/26

Headline: “Opinion | One defiant stand is sending shockwaves through Trump’s media takeover”

Over the past year and a half, we’ve watched Brendan Carr, Trump’s hitman at the FCC, go to CPAC conferences and brag about how he’s going to assault stations that say things he and Trump dislike. He’s trying to intimidate ABC affiliates into muzzling Jimmy Kimmel — again. And he succeeded in taking down Stephen Colbert.

“And a Trump-adjacent billionaire nepo-baby has acquired CBS and is systematically stripping it of its journalistic integrity,

Read the full article at:

https://www.alternet.org/alternet-exclusives/scott-pelley-trump/

Interview Tyrants?

by

Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Joel Simon, 6/1/26

Headline:  “Should Journalists Interview Dictators?”

Subhead:  “Encounters on the line between control and conditions.”

“. . .The trope of the dictator interview—presenting a despot as a celebrity, a figure of popular fascination with whom a reporter has managed to secure time—crystallized in the sixties and seventies, when Oriana Fallaci, an Italian journalist and provocateur, confronted Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, among others. In 1979, not long after the triumph of the Iranian revolution, she interviewed Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and—famously—ripped off her chador, calling it a “stupid medieval rag.” Barbara Walters took the opposite tack, humanizing and personalizing repressive leaders such as Fidel Castro, whom she first interviewed in 1977, and Mu‘ammar Gaddhafi, with whom she spoke a dozen years later. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/feature/should-journalists-interview-dictators-dan-rather-jon-lee-anderson-christiane-amanpour.php

No Questions From Her!

by

Article in Mediaite by Michael Luciano, 6/3/26

Headline:  “Kaitlan Collins Responds To Trump’s Oval Office Outburst at Her, Points Out She ‘Had Yet To Ask the President a Question’ “

“. . .the president seemed clearly irritated when he was asked earlier today why his administration says it is not moving forward with that $1.8 billion anti-weaponization fund, as they have called it,’ she said. ‘And just to note, as you’re about to listen to this, this first exchange actually occurred before I had yet to ask the president a question’. . . .”

” ‘CNN’s a very corrupt organization with a corrupt reporter standing right there,’ Trump said. ‘Never smiles. A young, beautiful woman. Never smiles. I never see a smile on her face. I see her standing there with hatred in her eyes’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.mediaite.com/media/tv/kaitlan-collins-responds-to-trumps-oval-office-outburst-at-her-points-out-she-had-yet-to-ask-the-president-a-question/

Replacement for “60 Minutes”

by


Article in The Wrap by Alyssa Ray, 6/3/26

Headline:  “Jimmy Kimmel Rips the ‘Trump Suck-Ups’ at CBS News After Scott Pelley’s ’60 Minutes’ Termination | Video”

Subhead: “ ’60 Minutes’ will be replaced by new episodes of ‘Reporters Unleashed,’  the late night host quips”

“The “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” host touched on Pelley’s ousting from the storied news program during Wednesday’s monologue, in which he celebrated the longtime journalist for standing for ‘truth and integrity.’

“ ‘Last night, the Trump suck-ups at CBS fired a great and deeply respected journalist, Scott Pelley, from his job at “60 Minutes,” because he stood up for truth and integrity at a show that’s been the gold-standard for broadcast journalism for 57 years,’ Kimmel said. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thewrap.com/creative-content/tv-shows/jimmy-kimmel-reacts-scott-pelley-60-minutes-firing-slams-cbs-news/

Rt. Wing Media – No Oil Spike

by


Article in Media Matters by John Knefel, 6/4/26

Headline:  “Oil executives warn of imminent price spike as right-wing media downplay risks”

Subhead:  “Conservative media figures have spent months trying to reassure their audiences that gas prices are going to come down any day now”

“Oil executives reportedly have warned the Trump administration that the Iran war is likely to cause global energy prices to skyrocket in the coming weeks, contrary to promises from right-wing media figures that the conflict will actually lower fuel costs or that any rise would be short-lived.

“According to Politico, Iran’s ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz ‘is steadily draining inventories to levels that are likely to send global energy prices surging in the next several weeks’ in ‘what has become the biggest disruption in crude oil flows ever’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.mediamatters.org/us-iran-relations/oil-executives-warn-imminent-price-spike-right-wing-media-downplay-risks

 

CBS Firings – Weiss Responds

by

Article in The Hill by Sarah Davis, 6/3/26

Headline:  “Bari Weiss: Scott Pelley fired from ’60 Minutes’ for breaking ‘foundation’ of trust “

The head of CBS News told staff on Wednesday that the network’s decision to fire a longtime ‘60 Minutes’ correspondent involved a breach of trust, according to an audio transcript of an editorial call reported by The New York Times.

“ ‘’m only interested in working in a newsroom that is built on trust and mutual respect; we cannot do our work without it. That foundation was broken on Monday,’ Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss reportedly told the newsroom on the morning call.

Read the full article at:

https://thehill.com/homenews/media/5909018-scott-pelley-fired-cbs-weiss-trust/

Press Freedom Groups Warn

by

Article in The Wrap by Josh Dickey, 6/2/26
”
Headline:  “Next After ’60 Minutes’ Amid ‘Existential Threat’ of Paramount Merger”

Subhead: “The coalition of nine journalism advocacy groups calls the ’60 Minutes’ firings ‘a grotesque effort … to appease a sitting president’ “

“A group of nine press freedom advocacy groups on Tuesday warned that the impending Paramount merger with Warner Bros. represents an ‘existential threat to the free press, independent media and free speech,’ suggesting CNN will be the next to suffer the drastic firings and turmoil that ‘60 Minutes’ has been going through in recent days. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thewrap.com/media-platforms/journalism/press-freedom-groups-paramount-merger-threat-cnn-60-minutes/

Pushing Ideology Into Iconic Program

by

Article in The Guardian by Anna Betts and Jeremy Bar, 6/3/26

Headline:  “Fired 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley says CBS told him to inject ‘falsehoods’ into reporting”

Subhead:  “Veteran journalist says executives pushed unverified claims and gave politicians a say in interviews”

“. . .’When stewardship of the program passed to my colleagues and me, our responsibility was to expand energetically into a new age of media technology while preserving the values our audience expects. Now, the new owner of our network is casting this legend aside, apparently to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration.’

“Pelley criticized the new leadership at CBS, adding: ‘Last month, 60 Minutes lost its DNA when our entire senior leadership and two of our best on-air correspondents were cruelly fired without cause’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2026/jun/03/60-minutes-scott-pelley-cbs-accusations