Veteran British broadcaster Sir Trevor Phillips had blunt advice for CBS News colleagues facing critics who question the network's editorial integrity: “Why don’t you just fuck off and let us do our jobs?”
Phillips made the remark during a contentious meeting of the network’s London bureau on Tuesday, according to an audio recording reviewed by The Guardian. The meeting saw foreign editor Shayndi Raice deliver a lengthy tirade criticizing unnamed staffers for suggesting editorial oversight amounted to “interference,” and informing colleagues that disobeying editors would be insubordination and “legal grounds for firing.”
Phillips defends Raice and urges unity
Phillips initially spoke up to defend Raice, saying her message was common sense. “I’m genuinely surprised that you had to say anything that you just said in the last 15 minutes,” he said. “It just seems to be axiomatic in any organization … I did want to say that I’m kind of surprised that in an organization of this vintage and capability, with the clever people I’ve met around here, that any of this actually has to be said.”
He then turned to outside criticism of CBS, noting he faced backlash after it was announced he was leaving Sky News to join the network as senior global affairs correspondent. Phillips is also a contributor to CBS’s 60 Minutes and voiced a short piece on protests in Europe the previous Sunday.
New era for journalists
Phillips said he could spend an hour recounting the people who warned him the move would end his career. “I think we’re in a new game now, actually, where we are now players as journalists,” he said. “And what people are constantly trying to do is to knock us off – to frighten us, essentially, into doing this or doing that. It puts a premium on two things – one is our objectivity, and two: having each other’s backs.”
He added: “I think the worst thing that can happen now is if we start to go about telling people, ‘Well, I would have done this if the higher-ups hadn’t told me to do that.’ That’s exactly what everybody wants us to get into the game of. That’s how we become vulnerable. That’s how we start adjusting our copy according to somebody else’s lines outside of here … I think what you said is really, really important, but it points me in the direction of us having the mentality – forgive my French here – of telling everybody, ‘Why don’t you just fuck off and let us do our jobs?’”
Phillips’s appointment at CBS was announced in June, after billionaire owner David Ellison installed opinion journalist Bari Weiss as editor-in-chief, a move that shook staff. Since CBS parent Paramount Global was acquired by Skydance Media in summer 2025, leadership has faced accusations of tilting editorial coverage in a more conservative-friendly direction. A CBS News spokesperson did not comment on the meeting.
