Battle between Bari Weiss and 60 Minutes explodes as Scott Pelley accuses her of murdering the show

If you thought there was an uproar at “60 Minutes,” that was pattycake compared to what happened yesterday.

Bari Weiss has been under assault by since becoming editor-in-chief of CBS, mostly from liberals and left-leaners who are convinced shes a crazy conservative. Thats not true, and Ive mostly defended her, but she has made some rookie mistakes as someone who never worked in television.

So even as the headlines swirled around decision to drop the $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund – made possible because many Republicans joined Democrats in openly criticizing the fund aimed at the Jan. 6 rioters – Weiss is facing a rebellion of her own.

First she fired “60 Minutes” correspondents Cecilia Vega and Sharyn Alfonsi (whose story on a Salvador prison she held, but ran intact after Trump officials wouldnt appear), along with executive producer Tanya Simon. 

Ratings for “CBS Evening News” have plunged under new anchor Tony Dokoupil, though not all is his fault – CBS failed to get him a visa for Trumps trip to Beijing, and he had to report from Taiwan.

But “60 Minutes” has always been different, the crown jewel of the onetime Tiffany network. It operates from a separate building, across . Its ratings have been terrific, and the show also makes money, over $200 million in advertising for the network.

After 58 years on the air, its averaging an impressive 9.1 million viewers, a 9% jump over last season, and has a substantial digital presence.

But this is why I think Weiss, who Ive interviewed, made a major mistake in hiring tech journalist Nick Bilton to run the newsmagazine.

He may be a great guy, but he, too, has never worked in the broadcast business. Its almost like thats a disqualification in the Weiss era.

Bilton has worked for the and Vanity Fair. He met Weiss while working on some documentary projects together.

“When you take an insider and put them inside a company, nothing changes,” Bilton told the Times. “Im not saying that were going to change the show completely and drastically.”

“If you dont disrupt, you yourself will be disrupted,” he says, according to Variety. “There is nothing I love more than picking a fight.”

But yesterday a leading member of the “60” crew, Scott Pelley, fought back hard, his voice breaking at times.

During an angry staff meeting, Pelley, a former evening news anchor, said of Weiss: “She is murdering 60 Minutes. She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and shes been doing exactly that.”

Thats according to a recording of the meeting obtained by the Times.  

Pelley was just getting started: “She has no qualifications for her job; you have slender qualifications for this job. The changes that shes made at the Evening News have been catastrophic, so why should we expect that any of this is going to be any better?”

Bilton responded that “I will show you…Ill be meeting with everyone. Im very excited to meet with everyone, yourself included.”

Pelley pressed the shows new boss on why he accepted the job, “knowing that you will never be welcome here.”

That drew some pushback: “I have been a journalist for 25 years, Scott. Ive sat across from incredibly powerful people like you have, and none of it intimidates me.”

Weiss apparently was asked to stay away from the meeting.

Look, Bilton may have some good ideas. In the past, the network created “60 Minutes II,” which ran for seven seasons but folded after a Dan Rather segment on George W. Bush and the National Guard that turned out to be based on forged documents, and both CBS and the anchor apologized.

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So heres the dilemma. Pelley and Lesley Stahl are the most prominent of the shows anchors. 

If Weiss fire