CBS veteran Dan Rather has called his former network a “disaster” and charged that its leadership has turned it into a version of Fox News.
Rather, who turns 95 on Saturday, didn’t hold back over the changes at CBS News in an interview with Variety published Monday. He argued that President Trump and corporate interests have been the beneficiaries of the shake-up.
He described it as “in many ways a disaster,” with the damage going well beyond the employees who were still working at the network.
He blamed the turmoil on the increasing influence of billionaires in American journalism and their ties to political power.
He was very specific in his criticism of CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, accusing her of taking the network down the path of becoming “a version of Fox News” since she’d taken over the newsroom.
“You judge a person by what they do, and what she’s done is she’s quickly turned CBS News in the direction of being a version of Fox News, perhaps a little more palatable,” he said. “But I didn’t know her beforehand, and I don’t know her now. Frankly, we didn’t hear much about her until she was rewarded with many millions of dollars for her company and then paid to come in and start destroying CBS News.”
Weiss was appointed following the 2025 completion of the Skydance merger with Paramount, the parent company of CBS, by billionaire David Ellison. Ellison is a Trump ally, and Weiss had previously founded The Free Press, which Paramount acquired.
Rather maintained that the new ownership had enabled Trump to do something he’d long desired, namely to damage 60 Minutes, the investigative program that the president has lashed out against repeatedly.
“The wreckage of CBS News is everywhere,” Rather declared, warning that the changes were still continuing and that they would be very difficult to reverse.
His comments come after months of turmoil at 60 Minutes, with long-serving correspondents Scott Pelley and Sharyn Alfonsi among those axed as part of a massive management shake-up.
Both were praised by Rather for standing up to the changes they felt would undermine the program’s journalistic independence, especially Pelley, who took the opportunity to publicly challenge the new management.
He said journalists needed to “start challenging the power,” even if that meant there were professional consequences for speaking out.
Pelley had previously accused management of introducing political bias into CBS reporting. CBS News has denied the allegations of political interference, stating that editorial decisions were made with the intent of improving both accuracy and fairness.
The standoff also comes on the back of Paramount’s controversial $16 million settlement of Trump’s lawsuit over the 2024 60 Minutes interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. Paramount didn’t issue an apology as part of that settlement.
Rather previously criticized the settlement as a surrender to the president’s pressure, and he now goes on to criticize the direction of the network.
The former CBS Evening News anchor, who spent 24 years at the network, made it perfectly clear that his criticism was aimed at management, not at the many journalists who are still with the network.