Scott Pelley, hosts the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation's 60th Anniversary Gala on November 19, 2015. Cindy Ord/Getty Images for Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Scott Pelley took to Instagram on Saturday to express gratitude for those who have supported him amid his controversial firing from 60 Minutes.
“To all of you who have been so kind, you are the wind in my sails,” the former correspondent wrote in the caption of the post, which featured a photo of himself behind the wheel of a sailboat. “So deeply grateful.”
Pelley was fired on Tuesday after an intense meeting with 60 Minutes‘ new executive producer, Nick Bilton, on Monday. In that meeting, Pelley argued that CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is “murdering 60 Minutes. She does not love this place; she was brought in to kill it and is doing exactly that.”
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After the news was announced that he was let go from the flagship newsmagazine, Pelley released a statement where he accused Weiss of “incompetence and unprofessionalism,” and claimed that CBS News management “instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story.”
“60 has been the number-one program in America for decades because our beloved audience finds integrity, quality, and humanity in our stories,” Pelley wrote. “Now, the new owner of our network is casting this legend aside, apparently to curry a moment of favor with the Trump administration.”
During a Wednesday morning call with staff, Weiss pushed back against Pelley, arguing that he broke “trust and mutual respect.”
Pelley’s firing followed the dismissal of EP Tanya Simon and correspondents Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi. The dismissal of so many mainstay 60 Minutes producers and correspondents led many to question if Lesley Stahl, Bill Whitaker and Jon Wertheim, the three remaining correspondents at the show, would also step away.
On Friday, Stahl, Withaker and Wertheim confirmed that they would not be exiting 60 Minutes.
“We feared that our returning might be construed as an endorsement of the existing power structure. That is simply, categorically not the case,” they wrote in a memo to staff. “Here’s why we’re are staying: We don’t want to see 60 Minutes die.”
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