Founder of 'Free Press' website named editor-in-chief of CBS News

Paramount said Monday that it has bought the news and commentary website The Free Press and installed its founder, Bari Weiss, as the editor-in-chief of CBS News, saying it believes the country longs for news that is balanced and fact-based.

It’s a bold step for the television network of Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather and “60 Minutes,” long viewed by many conservatives as the personification of a liberal media establishment. The network is placing someone in a leadership role who has developed a reputation for resisting orthodoxy and fighting “woke” culture.

No purchase price was announced for The Free Press, which has grown to reach 1.5 million subscribers since Weiss started it in 2021 after leaving The New York Times as an opinion editor. When she left the Times, she wrote a letter of resignation that spoke of a culture of intolerance at the newspaper and said she was bullied by colleagues who disagreed with her.

Some at CBS News have been concerned about what they see as signs that the news division is moving in a direction more friendly to President Donald Trump. Paramount’s merger with Skydance was approved by the administration shortly after Paramount settled the president’s lawsuit against “60 Minutes.” Ellison has hired Kenneth Weinstein, former head of a conservative think tank and a Trump contributor, as an ombudsman to examine complaints about CBS News.

Broadcast news organizations are generally fading in influence with the growth of online alternatives, and have aging audiences. CBS is generally third in popularity behind ABC and NBC, but “60 Minutes” and “CBS News Sunday Morning” have devoted fan bases.

Weiss has worked in opinion journalism and has little background in broadcast journalism. She has described herself politically as a centrist and wrote a column for the New York Post in 2021 headlined, “10 ways to fight back against woke culture.”

Weiss told fellow CBS News employees that she stood for the same core journalistic values that have defined the profession from the beginning, including reporting on the world as it actually is and being fair, fearless and factual.

In separate staff memos, Ellison and Weiss outlined similar philosophies about a mainstream America being ill-served by a destructive form of partisanship.

“When we reduce every issue to ‘us vs. them’ or ‘my way vs. the wrong way,’ we close ourselves off from listening, learning and ultimately growing, both as individuals and as a society,” Ellison wrote. “I don’t pretend to have a solution to this challenge. But I do believe we each have a responsibility to do our part.”



(AP Photo Steven Senne)