CBS is airing a 60 Minutes report on Trump’s deportations that was abruptly pulled a month ago

“60 Minutes” on Sunday aired its story about the Trump administration’s deportations that was suddenly pulled from the news magazine’s lineup a month ago, a move that sparked an internal battle over political pressure that has spilled into the public eye.

Reporter Sharyn Alfonsi did not mention her dispute with CBS News editor-in-chief Barry Weiss in the story about deportees sent to the harsh CECOT prison in El Salvador. When the segment was cut from the December 21 episode on Vice’s orders, Alfonsi told her 60 Minutes colleagues that it “wasn’t an editorial decision, it was a political decision.”

Weiss had argued that the story did not adequately reflect the administration’s viewpoint or prior reporting by other news organizations earlier.

The story that ran Sunday did not include any on-camera interviews with Trump administration officials. But it included statements from the White House and Department of Homeland Security that were not part of what Alfonsi used before withdrawing her story. Some of the statements, which were published in full on the 60 Minutes website, are dated before December 21.

“Since November, 60 Minutes has made several attempts to interview key Trump administration officials on camera for our story,” Alfonsi said. “They rejected our requests.”

Alfonsi did not immediately respond to a message from The Associated Press on Sunday. She said in her email that the administration’s refusal to agree to on-camera interviews was a tactical maneuver intended to kill the story.

CBS says it will always air the piece

In a statement, CBS News said, “Its leadership has always been committed to airing ’60 Minutes’ from CECOT as soon as it is ready. Tonight, viewers will get to see it, along with other important stories, all of which speak to CBS News’ independence and the power of our storytelling.”

Alfonsi’s report was the second of three on Sunday’s show, with the lead story being a report by Cecilia Vega from Minneapolis on Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s efforts and protests over its tactics.

The initial decision to sideline Alfonsi’s CECOT story became a flashpoint for critics who said the hiring of Weiss, a Free Press founder who had no prior television news experience, represented an attempt by the network’s new corporate leadership to curry favor with Trump.

After being pulled from broadcast in December, Alfonsi’s original story was accidentally made available online. CBS News provided a copy of the newsmagazine to Global Television, the network that broadcasts “60 Minutes” in Canada, which posted it on its website before a last-minute switch removed the piece.

This enabled eagle-eyed viewers to see what Weiss rejected, giving them the opportunity to compare it to what 60 Minutes eventually put on air.

The body of the story has not changed. It included a short clip of President Donald Trump saying that prison operators “don’t play games,” and a clip of White House press secretary Carolyn Leavitt saying that “heinous monsters, rapists, murderers, sexual assaulters, and predators who have no right to be in this country” were being sent there.

Alfonsi’s introduction has been updated to foreground the January 3 US raid that led to the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who is currently in US custody. It changed the end of the story to include the administration’s comment, including its explanation for not providing detailed records on migrants sent to El Salvador.

The department also provided photos of tattoos worn by the two immigrants Alfonsi interviewed, including a swastika that the interviewee said he got when he was a teenager and didn’t know what it meant.

The relationship between CBS management has evolved

Since Weiss’ appointment, Trump administration officials have been more visible on CBS News, in interviews that Weiss has sometimes helped arrange. Norah O’Donnell interviewed the president himself on “60 Minutes” on November 2.

The New York Times reported on Saturday that after Trump’s interview last week with Tony Dokoupil, anchor of the new “CBS Evening News,” Levitt told the network “We’ll sue you” if the entire interview was not broadcast.

The entire 13-minute interview was shown Tuesday, an unusual move for a broadcast network evening newscast, which is a half-hour summary of the day’s most important events. CBS told the Times that it decided to run the interview unedited at the time it was booked.

Trump has objected in the past to how his interviews were edited — including the publication of an unedited version of an interview Lesley Stahl gave on “60 Minutes” in 2020.

David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.