As a correspondent for “60 Minutes”, Bill Whitaker is unknown for his juggling skills. But at this point, the CBS News veteran has some ambitious challenges for a news magazine that is venerable in the air.
There are some that he hopes to be chosen for the show’s 58th season of the season. He recently traveled to Finland and the Baltic Sea. Authorities suspect the attack is part of a Russian campaign to destroy the underwater infrastructure of NATO allies. He has been working on the project for the past seven or eight months, he said in a recent interview. “I’m trying to peel off this onion. Something’s going on.
Whitaker, 74, also works on the view of sports that he believes, “You’ve never heard of, but I guarantee you’ll hear right away.” And then there is the story about a man who creates concert pieces from the sounds of animals. Such activities are “the 60 minute standard” and will host the season premiere on Sunday, September 28th. CBS debuted on Sunday night and is beginning to promote a new cycle with Cinematic, a few minutes of promotions that show the wide range of stories that are being prepared by wide story correspondents.
Still, life in the last few months in “60 minutes” is clearly unusual.
Producers, correspondents and staff on the long-term program are hoping to emerge from the season of turmoil, when the show became political hot potatoes and pawns in a big game between CBS News’ corporate owners Paramount and the US government.
Today, this story is familiar to media industry enthusiasts. In a lawsuit filed in federal court in the Northern District of Texas in November 2024, President Trump alleged that “60 minutes” had tried to mislead voters by airing two different statements made in an interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris. Legal experts believed Trump was barely standing there. Paramount’s management is keen to win FCC approval for sales to Skydance Media while working on a recession in traditional businesses and agreed to pay $16 million to resolve the issue. The transaction was then closed.
Meanwhile, a former CBS News executive claimed that Paramount is exposed to “60 minutes” by greater scrutiny of the kind of story that it intended to air. Wendy McMahon, CBS executive who oversaw the news department and CBS station, and Bill Owens, executive producer of “60 Minutes,” are suited to the audience for Owens’ lack of ability to “make independent decisions based on the rights of 60 minutes.” Veteran “60 Minutes” correspondent Leslie Stahl told Variety in April that she was “devastated” by his exit, hoping that corporate executives would realize the show was “one of the reasons why CBS News is worth it.” This program is the most popular news series on broadcast television.
Tanya Simon, the daughter of Bob Simon, a former executive editor of News Magazine and one of the show’s former correspondents, holds the reins of the show.
Staff say they want to move forward now. “All of these are beyond us, beyond us to tell you the truth. It’s beyond us,” he says. “Many of what happened doesn’t affect the powers and powers that we change. The power we have is the power of storytelling. Americans have the information we all need so that we can tell American stories, so we can all decide how government works.
Some of the stories in the “60 Minutes” editing pipeline quickly sway from recent headlines. Scott Perry, for example, interviewed Utah Gov. Spencer Cox in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s assassination. Perry also went to Utah Valley University with Cox to talk to students who witnessed Kirk’s shooting. Perry also traveled to Ukraine to report on Smee’s war crimes investigation.
Other correspondents are keeping up with people who influence the culture. Jon Wertheim spoke with UFC Commissioner Dana White about the quarter century at the helm of the league. Among the topics of their conversation, the 2026 UFC fight on the White House lawn. Stahl met director Rob Reiner on the set of his new New Orleans film, “Spinal Tap II: The End Continues,” and checked in with him 41 years after his debut in the original film, “This Is Spinal Tap.”
And some of Newsmagazine’s familiar faces are plans to show things viewers have never encountered before. Anderson Cooper has been working on a report on how decades of armed conflict in Columbia created a “no-go” region where rare species of birds were able to flourish. Then Cecelia Vega traveled to the foot of Mount Everest with Nima Linge Sherpa. —The youngest person to pinnacle the world’s tallest mountains, representing a new generation of Nepal climbers.
While the previous season of Newsmagazine was full of fuss, Whitaker says there’s a noise about what’s tied to the show almost every year. “There’s no normal season in the ’60 minutes.” It’s always chaotic and crazy and busy. “Even so, he said, “We’re all excited to move forward this season. I think it’s important to us and important to the country.”
