“60 Minutes” abruptly pulled a segment Sunday on the Trump administration deporting hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to a megaprison in El Salvador, a stunning move that comes on the heels of President Donald Trump complaining that the CBS newsmagazine has “treated him far worse” under new management.
For days, CBS had been promoting Sunday’s segment, “Inside CECOT,” which promised to reveal “brutal and torturous conditions” inside El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center. Correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi had spoken to now released deportees, according to a Friday press release. But the segment was pulled Sunday evening, around two hours before it was to set to air.
“The 60 Minutes report on ‘Inside CECOT’ will air in a future broadcast,” CBS told TheWrap in a statement. “We determined it needed additional reporting.”
Puck’s Dylan Byers reported that the segment “was fully ready and had been meticulously fact-checked and lawyered,” but editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, who watched it Friday, “decided to hold it.”
The decision to pull such a heavily promoted and presumably hard-hitting segment on the Trump administration is sure to come under intense scrutiny given the president’s recent comments about “60 Minutes” and his relationship with David Ellison, who now runs CBS News-parent Paramount.
Trump sued CBS last year over how “60 Minutes” edited an interview with his then-2024 rival, Kamala Harris. The network initially dismissed Trump’s suit as “without merit” and vowed to “vigorously defend” itself. But CBS-parent Paramount settled with Trump for $16 million in July as the company was seeking FCC approval to merge with Ellison’s Skydance.
Since the merger, Ellison appointed Weiss, the co-founder of the Free Press, to serve as editor-in-chief. Trump has praised Weiss in the past, as well as Ellison, who is now vying to takeover Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent company of CNN. Ellison’s father, billionaire Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, is a Trump supporter.
Trump returned to “60 Minutes” last month for his first interview since the settlement. “I see good things happening in the news. I really do. And I think one of the best things to happen is this show and new ownership, CBS and new ownership,” Trump said. “I think it’s the greatest thing that’s happened in a long time to a free and open and good press.”
But earlier this month, after “60 Minutes” aired an interview with his former ally turned critic Marjorie Taylor Greene, Trump referenced the settlement in taking aim at ownership.
“My real problem with the show, however, wasn’t the low IQ traitor, it was that the new ownership of 60 Minutes, Paramount, would allow a show like this to air,” Trump wrote. “THEY ARE NO BETTER THAN THE OLD OWNERSHIP, who just paid me millions of Dollars for FAKE REPORTING about your favorite President, ME!”
And last week, Trump unloaded again, “For those people that think I am close with the new owners of CBS, please understand that ‘60 Minutes’ has treated me far worse since the so-called ‘takeover,’ than they have ever treated me before. If they are friends, I’d hate to see my enemies.”
Watch a teaser for the “60 Minutes” segment below:
