Now-former CBS News producer Alicia Hastey revealed in a memo announcing her departure from the network that under Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss, stories are being vetted for their ideological content, rather than for their newsworthiness. The memo further confirms the network’s shift to the right under parent company Paramount’s pro-Trump leadership.
In Hastey’s memo, released Wednesday night, she laments Weiss for implementing a “sweeping new vision prioritizing a break from traditional broadcast norms to embrace what has been described as ‘heterodox’ journalism.”
Hastey explains that what she saw as the network’s commitment to telling stories about underrepresented communities and challenging conventional wisdom “is increasingly becoming impossible.”
“Stories may instead be evaluated not just on their journalistic merit but on whether they conform to a shifting set of ideological expectations,” Hastey writes. She alleges that this mindset leads to reporters practicing self-censorship or avoiding topics that “might trigger backlash or unfavorable headlines.”
