CHR - 60 Minutes Kamala Harris Interview: CBS Edited For Clarity or Politics

TOP LINE

This week, President Trump expanded his ten billion dollar lawsuit against CBS News after the network reluctantly released the full, unedited transcript and video from its October 60 Minutes interview with Vice President Kamala Harris.  

However, the release of unedited materials did not end the discussion.  A fair minded review confirmed 60 Minutes did Harris favors in the edit room because it transformed rambling responses into a crisp, succinct broadcast segment.  

My training is that the final cut should reflect, not distort the candidate’s overall performance.  The Kamala Harris 60 Minutes interview transcript should also be assessed in a broader context. Is there a pattern and practice of heavy handed editing at 60 Minutes that favors democrats over republicans?   

It begs another question: In October 2023, did then President Joe Biden also get a favorable edit that concealed his cognitive decline?  I don’t know the answer, but the FCC can get one and American voters deserve more transparency.

On 60 Minutes Executive Producer Bill Owens' watch, there have been other, well-documented controversies.   

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DEEP DIVE

In October 2020, 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl insisted to President Trump the Hunter Biden laptop could not be verified.  That same month, Norah O’Donnell asked then candidate Biden if he believed the laptop was part of a “Russian disinformation campaign.”

As a senior investigative correspondent at CBS News, I knew first-hand the laptop contents could be verified.  In October 2020, I was asked for confirmed Hunter Biden reporting by senior executive Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews.  I provided a handful of authenticated records from the laptop including a million dollar retainer from a Chinese businessman.

As I watched the 60 Minutes’ Trump and Biden interviews, I felt sick and despondent.  If I could verify contents from Hunter Biden’s laptop on my own, certainly the 60 Minutes team could also do it.

In October 2020, I saw an opportunity for CBS News to lead, rather than follow the pack.  The CBS News investigative unit, of which I was a part, was not tasked with developing more reporting on the laptop following my initial authentication, that would have been standard practice. It was a missed opportunity for the network.

In 2021, Republican Governor Ron DeSantis also accused 60 Minutes of deceptive editing for an investigation into COVID vaccine distribution by a supermarket chain. 

More recently, the ADL took offense with a 60 Minutes report critics called ‘one sided’ with ‘anti-Israel bias.” The NY Post reported that Paramount chairwoman Shari Redstone got involved and allegedly pressed CBS News President Wendy McMahon to fire Owens.

Good investigations welcome criticism and seasoned investigative reporters are accustomed to scrutiny.  But you have to ask yourself, why recent complaints against 60 Minutes seem to largely come from one side of the political aisle?   

As a threshold matter, all broadcast TV interviews must be condensed. The Kamala Harris video edit that sparked the FCC complaint was not a technical foul. But my training is that newsmaker interviews, such as a candidate for president, are held to the highest standard.  The final cut should reflect, not distort the candidate’s overall performance.  

When successive interview edits for ‘clarity’ are bundled together, they can transform the final segment, and cross a dangerous line into news distortion.  60 Minutes could have done itself a favor by including at least one of Harris’ awkward, rambling responses.  I clocked one answer at over three minutes.   It was a data point that voters deserved in the final weeks of the Presidential campaign.

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