Wednesday was a grim day at CBS News as reportedly around 100 people were axed as part of long-rumored layoffs numbering 2,000 people across its parent company Paramount Skydance. The ranks of those let go were vast and deep with both remaining CBS Saturday Morning hosts shown the door, correspondents with decades of experience (and all women), its Race and Culture unit, and even two entire shows.
Most notably, CBS Saturday Morning co-hosts Dana Jacobson and Michelle Miller were reportedly let go, along with their executive producer Brian Applegate. Miller had been with CBS since 2004 and Jacobson since 2018.
While the New York Post said the show will be “slated for a radical revamp,” The Los Angeles Times’s Stephen Battaglio reported Wednesday afternoon the show would live on with “a new format that will align it closer to the weekday show.” Either way, it was unclear as of Wednesday night whether a final episode will air of the current format.
Miller provided years of reliable biased content for NewsBusters as well as anytime her husband Marc Morial of the far-left National Urban League surfaced on a CBS show and their ties went undisclosed.
Two other shows going by the wayside are CBS Mornings Plus and CBS Evening News Plus. Mornings Plus launched on September 30, 2024 and has been co-hosted by Tony Dokoupil and Adriana Diaz featuring new interviews, a “By the Way” deep dive on a major story of the day (which we often picked up at NewsBusters), and extended conversations with guests from CBS Mornings.
Despite having only been on the air since February 10, CBS Evening News Plus’s demise was far less surprising given anchor John Dickerson’s Monday announcement he would be leaving the network at year’s end.
Status’s Oliver Darcy reported Monday that Dickerson’s departure had been in the works for some time given the pompous, liberal anchor’s tilt bearing little resemblance to what editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is building.
That said, we’re selfishly sad to see Evening News Plus head out to pasture as Dickerson’s end-of-show commentaries were rife with partisan, pompous sneering.
In the correspondent ranks, senior foreign correspondent Debora Patta was let go despite having been a mainstay on CBS since 2013. Patta’s presence has almost been ubiquitous since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 terror attacks on Israel as she reliably peddled the Gazan propaganda of the day.
As per Battaglio, the other on-air talent who were laid off consisted of New York-based national correspondents Nikki Battiste and Nancy Chen, Texas-based correspondent Janet Shamlian (who had a decade at NBC before six years at CBS), and contributor Lisa Ling.
Battiste (in the adjacent photo) had been on air a day before receiving the proverbial pink slip, offering the latest report on passion project of hers in spotlighting the IVF industry and depths couples will go to have children.
As elitist, legacy, liberal media continue to lose both credibility and viewership, this marked the latest set of major layoffs at third-place CBS News. Past waves included layoffs in May 2020 enveloping the late Mark Knoller, September 2024 (that included former Evening News anchor Jeff Glor), and February 2024 (which caught up D.C.-based Christina Ruffini).
