US broadcaster CBS fires 60 Minutes’s Scott Pelley after clash with bosses

Key points

• Veteran journalist’s dismissal comes after he reportedly accused management of ‘murdering’ influential news programme.
• US broadcaster CBS has fired Scott Pelley, a longtime correspondent for its 60 Minutes programme, after he reportedly said Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss was “murdering the show” and accused its new producer of having “slender qualifications” for the job.
• The firing on Tuesday deepened the turmoil at the most influential TV news programme in the US, days after a leadership overhaul.
• Pelley, 68, criticised management on Monday during a fiery staff meeting with Nick Bilton, the programme’s new executive producer installed by Weiss last week, according to a report on the Status website.
• In a termination notice obtained Tuesday night by The Associated Press news agency, Bilton, a technology journalist and filmmaker with no traditional broadcast news experience, accused Pelley of carrying out an “ambush” against him.