Sharon Waxman and Adam Chitwood write for The Wrap about a significant development within the legacy media.
Paramount is on the verge of acquiring Bari Weiss’ right-leaning Free Press news organization, with Weiss set for a top role in running CBS News, TheWrap has learned.
The deal, which is being finalized by Paramount’s lawyers and was first reported by Puck on Wednesday, sets CBS News on a course for a more conservative approach in line with CEO David Ellison’s vision. TheWrap’s reporting suggests it’s likely that Weiss will run CBS News.
Weiss, who founded Free Press in 2022 after leaving the New York Times where she was an opinion columnist, is respected by some for her independent approach and her critique of mainstream media as too woke, but criticized by others for giving a pass to powerful people with whom she agrees such as Elon Musk when he bought Twitter in 2022 and Peter Thiel who she interviewed sympathetically earlier this year on her podcast, declining to push back on non-answers.
Paramount declined to comment. Weiss did not respond to TheWrap’s request for comment.
CBS News has been the subject of a political tug-of-war and a target of the Trump administration, which extracted a $16 million settlement from a lawsuit over a “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris. As part of the Skydance merger, Paramount agreed to place an internal ombudsman to ensure that the news organization was even-handed as part of its negotiations with the Trump administration.
In one of its first moves after taking over Paramount, the Ellison-led leadership eliminated DEI initiatives at Paramount altogether.
The tug of war with the Trump administration continued just this week when Kristi Noem, who heads the Department of Homeland Security, accused the network of a “whitewash” when it chose not to air her full remarks on Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an undocumented immigrant who the Trump administration wrongly deported in March and has since tried to remove from the country.
