How Bari Weiss could change CBS News

The network of Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite is getting a new look. Paramount announced on Monday that Bari Weiss — founder of The Free Press, an online publication known mostly for anti-woke, pro-Israel opinionating — will be the new editor in chief of CBS News.

The Free Press brand emphasizes a sharply “contrarian point of view on politics and culture,” said The Wall Street Journal. Weiss, who started the publication after leaving The New York Times, saying that progressive staffers had bullied her for her views, will likely bring that same sensibility to CBS. The network is aiming at “that 70% of the audience that would really define themselves at center-left to center-right,” said Paramount CEO David Ellison. For her part, Weiss said she wants to create news that “doesn’t seek to demonize, but seeks to understand.” Network TV is in trouble, with broadcasts attracting “half the audience they commanded a quarter of a century ago,” said the Journal. Which raises the question: “Can Bari Weiss reinvent CBS News?”

‘Power’s version of the truth’

Weiss’ rise to the top of CBS News has been “seen as part of an effort to appease Donald Trump,” said Jon Allsop at The New Yorker. The network has already settled a “risible” presidential lawsuit and canceled Stephen Colbert’s late-night show. But Trump and Weiss “might not always be on the same team” and a “MAGA-fied CBS isn’t a guarantee.” It is more likely Weiss’ biggest impact will be on “stories that seem to animate her most — campus protests and Israel.”

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“How far CBS News has fallen,” said Sophia Tesfaye at Salon. Weiss “appears to have been hand-picked” despite “having zero broadcast news experience” by Larry Ellison, who is also a “top Trump donor.” (His company, Skydance, bought CBS as part of its recent purchase of Paramount.) The takeover of CBS News by Ellison and Weiss is a “sign of media decay” in which the “supposed watchdogs are now operatives.” As a result, we are more likely to get “power’s version of the truth” from our news.

Weiss is admittedly an “unorthodox choice to run a massive news organization” like CBS, said Chris Cillizza at his So What newsletter. But “mainstream media is failing,” with a collapsing business model and polling that shows legacy outlets have “almost completely lost the trust of the public.” Critics may worry that CBS is “putting an ideologue in charge of its whole operation.” There is an upside: Unlike most media executives, “her beliefs are out there for you to see and judge.”

A center-right operation?

Weiss has made a career of “pillorying the mainstream media for everything they get wrong,” said Andrew Prokop at Vox. The question is whether CBS News will merely be “somewhat more responsive to conservatives’ critiques” or if it will become a wholly “center-right operation.” A full revamp could look like Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter, now X. But “you don’t put Weiss in charge of your mainstream media organization if you are seeking only minor changes.”