{"id":782188,"date":"2026-07-24T17:04:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T17:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/782188\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T17:04:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T17:04:10","slug":"bari-weiss-pushed-60-minutes-to-report-on-events-that-never-happened-cecilia-vega-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/782188\/","title":{"rendered":"Bari Weiss Pushed 60 Minutes to Report on Events ‘That Never Happened,’ Cecilia Vega Says"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tCecilia Vega<\/a>, who was fired as a correspondent from CBS News\u2019 \u201c60 Minutes\u201d<\/a> as part of a major shake-up three months ago, is speaking out about her experience at the TV newsmagazine under Bari Weiss<\/a>\u2018 leadership.<\/p>\n

\n\tVega claimed that the \u201cnew administration\u201d at CBS News<\/a> \u2014 indicating Weiss, whom Paramount CEO David Ellison installed as editor in chief of the division last fall \u2014 asked her to report on events that \u201cnever happened\u201d and had pushed her and her team to include claims in stories that they were unable to verify.<\/p>\n

\n\tVega made the comments in a discussion Thursday with ABC News correspondent John Qui\u00f1ones at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists Conference & Expo in New Orleans. Her remarks were first reported by Status<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tVega said that in her coverage following the fatal shootings in January 2026 of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota, she was encouraged by CBS News executives to include video of protesters assaulting people they believed were undercover ICE agents. According to Vega, her team searched for evidence of that \u2014 but found \u201cno credible examples\u201d of such incidents.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition, Vega said she was asked to include an excerpt from Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey\u2019s comments at a press conference that he wanted the police to fight ICE agents enforcing immigration policies. According to Vega, her team watched \u201cevery frame\u201d of the footage and did not find the moment in question. \u201cThat never happened,\u201d Vega said. \u201cWe could not find any instance of the mayor saying something like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVega offered other examples of CBS News management attempting to interfere with her stories. For a story about about West Virginia residents affected by SNAP benefit cuts in the state, Vega claimed she was questioned why she had not interviewed Vice President JD Vance or referenced his memoir \u201cHillbilly Elegy\u201d \u2014 which centers on his upbringing in Ohio.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd, for a \u201c60 Minutes<\/a>\u201d piece about Donald Trump\u2019s war on Iran, Vega said she was told to open the segment with this: \u201cWho is winning the war? Iran is totally outgunned by the United States and Israel.\u201d That, she said, felt like an \u201cadministration talking point.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVega did not explicitly name Weiss as having made the requests, saying that the directives came under the \u201cnew administration at CBS News.\u201d She said things \u201cstarted to change when new people started showing up in the screenings and giving their feedback on pieces.\u201d Said Vega: \u201cNever in my career until now have I felt that those edits, those suggestions, came from a place of misinformation or politics. That\u2019s the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAsked for comment, a CBS News representative cited a statement it issued in May in the wake of Vega\u2019s comments after her firing<\/a>, in which she claimed that \u201cmy producing teams and I have experienced efforts to insert political bias into our stories.\u201d In that statement, CBS News said, \u201cWe respect Ms. Vega and her contributions, but her claims are not based in reality.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition, the network spokesperson pointed to a comment Weiss made in June, in which she said, \u201cWhat\u2019s being called \u2018editorial interference\u2019 is in reality the job description of an editor in chief.\u201d CBS News also noted that none of the examples Vega cited were incorporated into any report that was aired or published.<\/p>\n

\n\tDuring her talk at the NAHJ conference, Vega said she is still in the dark about why she was fired from \u201c60 Minutes,\u201d saying, \u201cI still have not been given a reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVega told Qui\u00f1ones that she had been afraid to discuss her departure from \u201c60 Minutes\u201d but said, \u201cIt\u2019s not that I just lost a job. There is a lot at stake. Sometimes you\u2019ve got to be scared and do it still.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cecilia Vega, who was fired as a correspondent from CBS News\u2019 \u201c60 Minutes\u201d as part of a major…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":782189,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[10673,100518,7930,292794,88],"class_list":["post-782188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-60-minutes","tag-bari-weiss","tag-cbs-news","tag-cecilia-vega","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=782188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/782189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=782188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=782188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=782188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}