The longtime correspondent was immediately terminated in an email.
CBS News has fired “60 Minutes” longtime correspondent Scott Pelley after a tense meeting with new Executive Producer Nick Bilton and editor-in-chief Bari Weiss on June 2.
Bilton emailed Pelley notifying him of his immediate termination following the meeting, citing Pelley’s “hostility” and “misconduct” during the meeting as reasons for the decision, according to a copy of the email obtained by The Epoch Times.
“Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt,” Bilton wrote. “I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort.”
Bilton called Pelley’s alleged actions during the meeting a “performative display of hostility” in the dismissal letter.
The executive management team tried again to meet with Pelley June 2, but the second meeting resulted in Pelley’s firing after 22 years.
“Despite yesterday’s misconduct, I had hoped that in sitting down with you today we could find a path forward together. You made clear that you are not interested in such a path,” Bilton wrote.
Bilton, a former technology journalist and filmmaker with no broadcast experience, said he started his job excited to collaborate with the staff and called Pelley to invite him to dinner to talk, but Pelley rejected the offer.
Pelley has not made a public statement as of publication. A request for comment to his booking agency was not immediately returned.
Pelley started working at CBS News in 1989.
Bilton started at the longest-running primetime news show on May 28. He was brought in as someone outside the traditional television news establishment to reshape the 57-year-old program for digital and streaming audiences.
