60 Minutes is seeing the departure of yet another veteran of the long-running news program. This time, a reporter behind a controversial story about Trump’s immigration crackdown is being let go, and the journalist is not biting her tongue concerning the politics that she sees behind the changes being made to 60 Minutes and CBS News.
Alfonsi let go months after story critical of Trump pulled from broadcast
The New York Times reported that Sharyn Alfonsi has not been offered a new contract as her current deal with 60 Minutes expires. As Blavity previously reported, Alfonsi was the journalist behind a 60 Minutes story on the brutal CECOT prison in El Salvador, where a number of people, including Kilmar Abrego Garcia, were sent after being deported by the Trump administration. The story on CECOT was controversially pulled hours before it was set to air, a decision made by CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss, who has been viewed as pushing the network in a more Trump-friendly direction.
Although Alfonsi remains employed by CBS News, her contract with 60 Minutes expired earlier this month, according to Variety. The outlet reported that CBS News executives made no effort to contact Alfonsi’s representatives at UTA to renew terms. CBS News declined to make executives available for comment.
In a statement issued Wednesday, Alfonsi blamed her departure from 60 Minutes on the clash over the CECOT story, an incident that she described as “a deliberate choice to penalize a journalist for refusing to sanitize factually accurate reporting, and it sends a chilling message to the entire newsroom.” Alfonsi, who has spent the majority of her nearly 20 years at CBS working at 60 Minutes, recounted that “Fearless, independent reporting has always been the defining standard at 60 Minutes.” In contrast, Alfonsi argued that “Today, CBS management is abandoning that mission, choosing access journalism over accountability and protecting power rather than scrutinizing it.” She declared that “the wall between editorial independence and corporate interest at CBS is being methodically torn down” and warned that “the result will be a broadcast that looks like 60 Minutes but lacks the courage and character to produce journalism that matters.”
Alfonsi also made clear that she is not voluntarily leaving the network. According to The New York Times, she said she does not expect to return to 60 Minutes without a contract in place, but added: “I’m not resigning. If they want me gone because I did my job, they’ll have to fire me.”
Changes to ’60 Minutes,’ CBS News and possibly CNN as well
60 Minutes has seen a number of high-profile departures in recent years that have been linked to alleged interference from CBS, seemingly in order to censor or delay reports critical of the Trump administration. Longtime producer Bill Owens left 60 Minutes in 2025 over what he saw as unprecedented corporate interference and scrutiny over the program’s reporting; the departure of Owens led to 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley criticizing CBS News on-air. Veteran journalist Anderson Cooper recently departed from 60 Minutes after not renewing his contract. Cooper has done a number of stories at odds with Trump administration policies, such as a report that debunked the Trump-pushed conspiracy theory of an anti-white genocide\] I don’t in South Africa.
The turmoil concerning 60 Minutes is part of a larger shift in tone and content for CBS News relating to parent company Paramount’s sale to Trump ally David Ellison and the hiring of conservative-friendly Bari Weiss as CBS News editor-in-chief. The change has included a more conservative-friendly retooling of the CBS Evening News under host Tony Dokoupil, a change that has seen on-air blunders and shaky ratings. CBS also recently ended The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, a cancellation widely seen as retaliation for Colbert’s frequent mocking of Trump. With Paramount Skydance carrying out a merger with Warner Bros. Discovery, Ellison will now control CNN as well, raising fears that the network may likewise be pushed in a right-wing direction. “This should worry you,” outspoken actor Mark Ruffalo posted about Alfonsi’s departure. “This is what will happen at @CNN with the Paramount Warner Bros. merger,” Ruffalo wrote along with a plea to “#blockthemerger.”
If the merger does go through — a prospect made more likely due to Trump’s friendship with Ellison — two major news networks will be controlled by Trump-friendly corporate leadership. As Alfonsi warns, such a development could have significant consequences for the future of responsible journalism as journalistic independence gives way to partisan pressures and the corporate desire for political access.