60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi issued a dire public warning about "corporate meddling" in journalism during a speech Thursday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., after receiving a Ridenhour Courage Prize for her "life-long defense of the public interest and passionate commitment to social justice."
Alfonsi made a series of thinly veiled remarks critical of CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss, who she clashed with last year over her report on migrants deported to El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison. "I will not linger on the internal mechanics of the dust-up at CBS that led to our CECOT story being pulled, but we have to be honest about what it represents," she said, according to The Guardian. "It wasn't an isolated editorial argument. In my view, it was the result of a more aggressive contagion: the spread of corporate meddling and editorial fear. It's hard to watch."
Alfonsi also said that "corporate calculations" were affecting journalism, stating, "Some executives are asking not, 'Is the story true?' but, 'Is it good for business?'" While she did not mention any executives by name, the audience booed when another speaker mentioned Weiss earlier in the event, according to The Guardian. Spokespeople for CBS News and 60 Minutes did not immediately return requests for comment from The Independent.
The speech followed the December leak of a memo in which Alfonsi complained that Weiss had "spiked" her story without explanation. In a subsequent leaked memo, Weiss—accused by critics of being "Trump-friendly"—said the segment did not "present the administration's argument for why it sent 252 Venezuelans to CECOT" and said that "we need to push much harder" to get officials "on the record." The story aired several weeks later without featuring interviews with Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, or Tom Homan, Trump's "border czar," both of whom Weiss mentioned in her memo.
Weiss was hired by David Ellison, son of billionaire and Republican mega-donor Larry Ellison, after his Skydance Media company bought CBS parent company Paramount Global for $8 billion in August. During negotiations over that deal, Paramount paid President Donald Trump $16 million to settle a lawsuit over his claim that 60 Minutes unfairly edited an interview with his 2024 opponent Kamala Harris. Trump later told 60 Minutes correspondent Norah O'Donnell, "I think one of the best things to happen is this show and new ownership—CBS and new ownership. I think it's the greatest thing that's happened in a long time to a free and open and good press."
During her Thursday speech, Alfonsi acknowledged that she refused to change her report after she was unable to arrange an interview with an administration official. "Not because I'm a pain in the ass, which I am, but because the story was factually correct, and I argued that any change to it might reflect poorly on CBS and 60 Minutes," she said. Alfonsi also said she believed she "was doing my job, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't scared." She added, "Fear is a funny thing—it can paralyze you, or it can point you to exactly what needs to be protected. Right now, our industry is afraid of the wrong things. We're afraid of offending power. We're afraid of losing access. We're afraid of another baseless lawsuit. But what we should all be afraid of is silence."
Alfonsi also revealed that someone apparently tried to "scare me into silence" by having a SWAT team sent to her house several days after the CECOT segment was held. She learned during her first job as a waiter that there's "a fine line between being a team player and being an accomplice." Alfonsi's previous awards include an Emmy for her work at 60 Minutes, but she admitted she was concerned about her professional future amid uncertainty about whether she'll return for the program's 59th season in September. "Thank you for this award. I didn't know that the theme was hope. My hope recently has been that I still have a job," she said. "And every morning I wake up to another headline that says I've been fired."
Alfonsi spoke after a speech by Bill Owens, who also received a Ridenhour Courage Prize after citing corporate interference when he resigned from his job as the longtime executive producer of 60 Minutes last year. "I always said I'd follow Bill over a cliff, and apparently I did," Alfonsi said.
