After some initial resistance, CBS News has cut ties with contributor Peter Attia, whose name appears more than 1,700 times in the files of pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
Attia, a physician who specializes in longevity medicine, was among the 19 contributors named last month by CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss. A CBS News executive confirmed Attia’s departure Monday.
Attia’s resignation was agreed upon after discussions with Weiss, according to one of her associates. He had not appeared on the network since the announcement of his hiring in January.
Once Attia’s name showed up in the cache of Epstein files released by the Department of Justice earlier this month, it seemed as though cutting him loose would be a no-brainer for the news division.
But Weiss, who came to CBS News when parent company Paramount acquired her contrarian digital site the Free Press last fall, is highly skeptical of cancel culture and resisted immediate action, according to people familiar with her thinking.
A representative for Attia said he quit because “he wanted to ensure his involvement didn’t become a distraction from the important work being done at CBS.”
Any appearance on the network probably would have generated a spate of negative stories.
Attia’s email exchanges with Epstein included a crude discussion about female genitalia.
Another message showed Attia expressing dismay that he could not discuss Epstein’s activities. “You [know] the biggest problem with becoming friends with you? The life you lead is so outrageous, and yet I can’t tell a soul …,” Attia wrote.
In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges of soliciting prostitution, including from a minor. He was found dead in his jail cell in 2019, about a month after being arrested on federal sex-trafficking charges
From a business standpoint, keeping Attia at CBS was untenable. Health-related segments are attractive to advertisers and it’s highly unlikely that any sponsor would want their commercials adjacent to him.
Attia had already been dropped by AGI, a company that makes powdered supplements,where he was a scientific advisor. He also stepped away from his role as chief science officer for David, a protein bar maker.
CBS News pulled an October “60 Minutes” profile of Attia that was scheduled to re-air this month.
Attia apologized for his interactions with Epstein. He said he had not been involved in any criminal activity and had never visited Epstein’s island.
“I apologize and regret putting myself in a position where emails, some of them embarrassing, tasteless, and indefensible, are now public, and that is on me,” Attia wrote. “I accept that reality and the humiliation that comes with it.”
Attia wrote the bestselling book “Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity” and hosts a popular podcast. His company, Early Medical, offers a program that teaches people to live healthier as they age.
It was an extraordinary media moment: CBS late-night host Stephen Colbert on Tuesday publicly blasted his own employer over its handling of his interview with Democratic U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico of Texas.
Colbert contended that his own network prevented him from airing the interview in an effort to appease the Trump administration, which CBS has denied. He chose instead to put the sit-down with the Texas state legislator on YouTube, which is not regulated by the FCC.
The standoff not only highlighted the simmering tensions inside CBS with the late-night host, it also marked the latest flash point in the ongoing clash between the Trump administration and leading media and entertainment figures — including other late-night hosts Seth Meyers and Jimmy Kimmel — who have been openly critical of the president’s policies.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr has been leading the charge, aggressively attempting to wield the long dormant equal time rules forcing broadcast TV stations to offer equal time to opposing candidates as a means of influencing the legacy media companies who President Trump believes treats him unfairly.
Carr contends the effort is a long overdue corrective to combat what he and Trump believe is liberal bias in broadcast network news coverage. He has even threatened to pull TV station licenses if programmers don’t get in line.
Last fall, he warned ABC that it could lose its TV station licenses after Kimmel made remarks on his program about slain right-wing activist Charlie Kirk that upset conservatives. Two major TV station groups pulled the program and the network suspended Kimmel‘s program for a week.
But experts say the efforts — along with the recent arrest of former CNN journalist Don Lemon over civil rights charges — pose a threat to constitutionally protected freedom of speech and would likely face court challenges.
“We don’t want the government trying to make decisions as to what counts as political speech and what doesn’t and what counts as fairness and what doesn’t,” media consultant Michael Harrison told The Times last month.
Some experts are also skeptical that Carr will ever make good on those threats through greater enforcement of the equal time provision.
Andrew Jay Schwartzman, a public interest communications attorney, said Carr is using his bully pulpit at the FCC to intimidate “a timorous broadcasting industry.”
“The Late Show with Stephen Colbert “ on July 23, 2024.
(Scott Kowalchyk / CBS)
“It’s just all bluster,” said Schwartzman. “Broadcasters are more interested in short-term regulatory relief from the FCC, and in the case of [CBS parent] Paramount, getting approval of a possible Warner Bros. Discovery deal.”
CBS cited financial losses as the reason for the cancellation of Colbert’s show, which ends in May, just two months before CBS parent Paramount Global closed its merger deal with Skydance Media, which required regulatory approval from the Trump administration. Paramount also has been attempting a hostile bid for Warner Bros. Discovery.
Paramount also drew scrutiny over its controversial decision to pay $16 million to settle Trump’s legal salvo against “60 Minutes” over the editing of an interview with his 2024 opponent, then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Most legal analysts viewed the case as frivolous.
Jeffrey McCall, a communications professor at DePauw University, said he understands why CBS did not want to invite FCC scrutiny.
“CBS could have other matters in front of the FCC,” McCall said. “So, I don’t blame CBS for trying to tell Colbert like, ‘hey, back off.’”
But McCall added that he sees no reason for the FCC to end or curtail the exemption daytime and late-night television talk shows have from laws requiring stations to offer equal broadcast opportunities to political candidates.
“They have a lot to do otherwise and I’m just not sure this is worth their trouble,” he said.
The equal time rules were devised at a time when consumers had a limited number of media options. Broadcast TV is no longer dominant in the era of streaming as evidenced by how the Talarico interview drew 8 million views on YouTube — more than three times the typical TV audience for Colbert’s “Late Show.”
Schwartzman noted that equal time provision cases are typically resolved quickly, as the rule only applies during an election campaign.
If Talarico’s interview had aired on TV and his opponents requested time, CBS would have to accommodate them ahead of the Texas primary election on March 3. (The network would not have been required to give time to Republican candidates).
CBS could have fulfilled the request by providing time on its affiliated stations in Texas. The opposing candidates did not have to appear on Colbert’s show.
“The remedy is you have to give them airtime,” Schwartzman said. “That’s all.”
CBS wanted Colbert to steer clear of Talarico because the FCC previously announced it is “investigating” ABC over the candidate’s appearance on “The View,” according to a network executive not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. Talarico was on the daytime talk show Feb. 2, which has led to the FCC launching an “enforcement action” on the matter.
Representatives from CBS and ABC declined comment.
Appearing Wednesday on Fox News Channel’s “The Ingraham Angle,” Carr brushed off accusations by Democrats that he was using the rule to silence their candidates.
“What we’re doing now is simply applying the law on the books,” Carr said.
When host Laura Ingraham noted that if CBS had aired the Talarico interview, it would have meant free airtime for Tarico’s primary opponent and high-profile Trump critic Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), Carr replied, “Ironically, yes.”
But Schwartzman noted that if the FCC punished a network for ignoring the rule, the move would likely be challenged in court and take years to resolve. Even if the policy were violated, that would not be enough to get a station license pulled.
“A single violation or even a couple of violations of FCC policy are meaningless,” Schwartzman said. “You have to demonstrate a pattern of violations.”
“We need more competition against THE ENEMY, the Fake News National TV Networks,” Trump wrote Feb. 7 on Truth Social. “Letting Good Deals get done like Nexstar — Tegna will help knock out the Fake News because there will be more competition, and at a higher and more sophisticated level.”
How Nexstar could take on the broadcast networks is a mystery. Nexstar is highly dependent on its affiliations with ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox due to their contracts with the NFL, which provide the stations with their highest-rated programming. Those network affiliations also give Nexstar leverage in its negotiations to get carriage on cable and satellite providers.
A protester holds a sign during a demonstration against the election process led by the state university and the candidacy of Guatemalan Attorney General Consuelo Porras for a Constitutional Court magistrate position in Antigua Guatemala, Guatemala, on Monday. The University of San Carlos, the state university, held an election to designate a magistrate to Guatemala’s Constitutional Court, but Porrwas excluded. Photo by Alex Cruz/EPA
Feb. 17 (UPI) — Human rights experts from the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner expressed concern about the possible link between Guatemala’s attorney general, Consuelo Porras, and alleged illegal adoptions of disappeared Indigenous children.
According to investigators, led by Special Rapporteur Margaret Satterthwaite, the adoptions would have occurred between 1968 and 1996 during Guatemala’s armed conflict — a period marked by human rights violations that particularly affected Indigenous communities.
The allegations refer particularly to 1982, when Porras headed the Elisa Martínez Temporary Home and allegedly acted as the “legal guardian” of minors who were later placed in irregular international adoptions.
“We are particularly concerned that a prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigation has not been carried out into the alleged involvement of certain state authorities in these processes and that the mothers affected by these illegal adoptions have apparently received neither recognition nor adequate reparations,” the U.N. experts said in a statement.
The Elisa Martínez Home operated as a center under the Directorate of Child and Family Welfare with the authority to oversee national and international adoptions.
Once children entered the home, the director or person in charge became their legal guardian, allowing them to process adoption proceedings in Guatemala and abroad under the adoption regulations in force at the time, Prensa Libre reported.
The controversy arose as Porras sought to become a magistrate of the Constitutional Court, the country’s highest court, once her term at the Public Ministry ends in May.
According to analysts, the attorney general was seeking refuge in the high court to obtain the protection granted by immunity, and submitted her candidacy to the Superior University Council of the University of San Carlos of Guatemala, digital outlet LaHora.gt reported.
However, after the report was made public, the university excluded her from the list of candidates for the court, determining that she did not meet the requirements of suitability and integrity.
The Public Ministry reacted strongly to the U.N. report. In an official statement, it described the allegations as “spurious, malicious and biased,” arguing they are based on unverified information intended to interfere in the country’s sovereign processes.
In a post on X, Porras rejected the accusations against her as “false and politically instrumentalized.” She said they lack evidentiary support and “are completely malicious, and far from protecting human rights, they violate and distort them.”
Porras’ defense maintains that her role at the Elisa Martínez Temporary Home was administrative and that she had no legal authority over the final destination of the minors. The attorney general also announced she is weighing legal action against the U.N. experts, arguing that her presumption of innocence has been violated.
While the experts insist on the need for independent and thorough investigations, Porras maintains that she is facing “international political persecution” aimed at weakening her position at the head of the Public Ministry.
Consuelo Porras was appointed in 2018 and ratified in 2022 as attorney general and head of Guatemala’s Public Ministry. Although her mandate is focused on criminal prosecution, her tenure has been internationally questioned and sanctioned by more than 40 countries, including the United States and the European Union, over allegations of corruption and undermining democracy.
Porras has been accused of using the justice system as a political weapon to protect corruption networks and pursue independent prosecutors, judges and journalists, triggering repeated citizen protests that demand her resignation.
After the election of President Bernardo Arévalo in 2023, the Public Ministry under Porras initiated a series of legal actions to attempt to annul the election results and cancel the ruling party, Semilla.
Since Arévalo took office, the relationship between him and Porras has been marked by constant confrontation.
Arévalo has sought legal mechanisms and legislative reforms to remove her, while Porras has refused to attend Cabinet summonses and has kept multiple investigations open against the president’s inner circle, generating institutional paralysis and a deep political crisis in the country.
The Norwegian diplomat who was a key architect of the 1993 Oslo Accords is facing a storm of corruption and blackmail allegations after new documents revealed he was deeply embedded in the inner circle of late sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein.
Terje Rod-Larsen, a central figure in the Middle East “peace process” in the 1990s, is implicated in newly released United States Justice Department files and Norwegian media investigations that expose a relationship involving illicit loans, visa fraud for sex-trafficked women, and a beneficiary clause in Epstein’s will worth millions of dollars.
The revelations have sent shockwaves through the diplomatic community and led to the resignation of Rod-Larsen’s wife, Mona Juul – herself a pivotal figure in the Oslo negotiations – from her post as Norway’s ambassador to Jordan and Iraq this month. Her security clearance was also revoked.
Palestinian leaders are now questioning whether Oslo’s foundational agreements of the two-state solution were brokered by a mediator vulnerable to elite blackmail and foreign intelligence pressure.
The plan was heralded in the Western world at the time, and in the 30 years since, has been trampled on by successive Israeli governments, with the far-right leadership now openly pushing for annexation of the occupied West Bank.
Investigations by the Norwegian broadcaster NRK and newspaper Dagens Næringsliv (DN) detail how Rod-Larsen used his position as president of the International Peace Institute (IPI) think tank in New York to launder the reputation of Epstein’s associates.
According to the files, Rod-Larsen wrote official letters of recommendation to US authorities to secure visas for young Russian women in Epstein’s orbit, claiming they possessed “extraordinary abilities” suitable for research roles.
In reality, these women were often models with no academic background who were allegedly trafficked and abused by the financier. One victim told NRK she believed Epstein sent her to Rod-Larsen’s institute “to manipulate” her, while another described how the diplomat facilitated her visa after a direct request from Epstein’s assistant.
The transactional nature of the relationship was explicit. Documents show Epstein loaned Rod-Larsen $130,000 in 2013. More damningly, reports indicate that Epstein’s last will and testament included a clause bequeathing $5m each to Rod-Larsen’s two children – a total of $10m.
‘Oslo was a trap’
For Palestinians living under the reality of the failed agreements Rod-Larsen forged, the scandal offers a disturbing explanation for a “peace process” that many believe was rigged.
Mustafa Barghouti, general secretary of the Palestinian National Initiative political party, told Al Jazeera he was “not surprised at all” by the corruption allegations.
“We never felt comfortable with this person from the very first moment,” Barghouti said. “Oslo was a trap … and I have no doubt that Terje Rod-Larsen was being effectively influenced by the Israeli side all along.”
Barghouti argued that the revelation of millions of dollars potentially flowing from a Mossad-linked figure like Epstein to the Rod-Larsen family suggests the corruption was “directed to serve Israel’s interests against the interests of the Palestinian people”.
The ties between the disgraced Epstein and Israel have come into sharp focus after the release of millions of documents.
The documents have revealed more details of Epstein’s interactions with members of the global elite, including former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. But they also document his funding of Israeli groups, including Friends of the IDF (Israeli army), and the settler organisation the Jewish National Fund, as well as his ties to members of Israel’s overseas intelligence services, the Mossad.
The missing archive
The scandal has reignited calls in Norway to open the “private archive” Rod-Larsen kept regarding the 1993 secret negotiations.
Media investigations have revealed that documents from the critical period between January and September 1993 are missing from the official Foreign Ministry archive. Critics argue these missing files could obscure the extent to which personal leverage or blackmail played a role in the concessions extracted from the Palestinian leadership during the secret talks.
Governing by blackmail
Analysts argue the Rod-Larsen case is symptomatic of a wider system of global governance driven by systematic blackmail and intelligence operations.
Wissam Afifa, a political analyst based in Gaza, drew a parallel between the exploitation of minors on Epstein’s island and the geopolitical treatment of Palestinians.
“We, as Palestinians, were treated as minors … considered as having no right to demand our rights,” Afifa said. “Today we discover that a large part of the international system is essentially ‘Epstein Island’”.
Afifa suggested that the “silence” of the international community regarding the current genocidal war on Gaza could be linked to similar networks of influence and extortion.
“The world was managed from Epstein’s island … in dark rooms,” Afifa added. “We are victims of the influence network that Epstein managed with politicians, leaders and states”.
As Norwegian authorities, including the economic crime unit Okokrim, open investigations into the scandal, the legacy of the diplomat who once shook hands on the White House lawn lies in tatters, casting a long shadow over the history of deeply flawed Middle East peacemaking.
YouTube TV will start offering customers lower-priced channel packages, including one aimed at sports fans.
The Google-owned pay-TV service announced Monday it will roll out more than 10 plans that will be priced below a full YouTube TV subscription that offers more than 100 channels.
The introduction, which will begin over the next few weeks, is in response to growing consumer resentment over the rising cost for the service, currently available for $82.99 a month. YouTube TV was introduced in 2017 as an alternative to increasingly expensive cable and satellite services with an initial price of $35 a month.
Consumer interest is likely to be highest for the Sports Plan, available this fall. For $64.99 a month, consumers will get the four broadcast networks, which all carry the NFL, plus Fox Sports 1, the NBC Sports Network and all of the ESPN channels. New subscribers will be offered a one-year introductory rate of $54.99 a month.
YouTube will also offer a Sports + News plan, which combine the two most-watched genres in the pay TV bundle. For $71.99 a month, consumers get the sports package and news networks CNN, Fox News, MS NOW, Bloomberg, C-SPAN and Fox Business. The introductory rate is $56.99.
The new plans will aim to compete with the direct to consumer offering of ESPN, which is available in tandem with Fox One, a service combining Fox Corp’s news and sports channels. The two are being offered together for $39.99 a month.
Over the last two years, El Segundo-based DirecTV rolled out smaller packages of channels aimed at consumers who no longer want a big monthly bill for networks they don’t watch. The satellite TV service now offers smaller genre packages of channels and streaming apps that cater to a particular interest available at a lower price — designed for news junkies, sports fans, children and Spanish-language speakers.
Pay-TV providers are under pressure to provide more pricing options to consumers to keep them from cutting the cord.
At the same time, carriage negotiations with programmers are more fraught, often leading to standoffs where channels are pulled, disrupting service to customers.
Disney’s channels, including ESPN, were off of YouTube TV for nearly 15 days last fall. Separately, YouTube TV customers lost access to Univision’s Spanish-language channels for two months, which drew the attention of legislators on both sides of the political spectrum.
YouTube, which has about 10 million subscribers, is also offering an Entertainment Plan that includes the major broadcast networks and an array of cable channels including FX, Hallmark, Comedy Central, Bravo, Paramount, Food Network and HGTV at $54.99 a month and an introductory rate of $44.99.
A News + Entertainment + Family Plan — which combines, news, entertainment and children’s channels including Disney Channel, Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon, will be available for $69.99 a month and an introductory rate of $59.99.
The Epstein files dump has led to days of intense media coverage, revealing how powerful elites around the world engaged in either illegal or morally reprehensible behaviour. But even as journalists sift through millions of documents, one of the most significant stories remains largely missing from the mainstream narrative.
Contributor: Murtaza Hussain – National security and foreign affairs reporter, Drop Site News
The farce of the ‘ceasefire’ coverage in Gaza
More than 500 Palestinians have been killed since a US-brokered “ceasefire” was signed, which begs the question: Should journalists, in contextualising the story, really be calling this a “ceasefire”? As Israel signals it’s preparing to resume full-scale war, we examine how media silence, selective framing and restricted access help keep Gaza off the world’s screens.
Featuring:
Shaiel Ben-Ephraim – Senior analyst, Atlas Global Strategies Diana Buttu – Palestinian lawyer Muhammad Shehada – Visiting fellow, European Council on Foreign Relations Daniel Levy – President, U.S./Middle East Project
The adage that records are made to be broken definitely applies to the TV ratings for the Super Bowl.
For three straight years, the game deciding the champion for the NFL season has set new viewing records, including last year’s Philadelphia Eagles crushing victory over the Kansas City Chiefs 40-22 that scored an average audience of 127.7 million viewers on Fox.
Both the 2024 and 2025 games had the benefit of the pop culture sizzle generated by Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce’s romance with pop superstar Taylor Swift, bringing in more casual fans.
This season, the Chiefs won’t be in the game for the first time in three years as NBC will have the Seattle Seahawks facing off Sunday against the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX, not the match-up experts predicted for this year.
But that doesn’t mean it can’t set another ratings record.
Kansas City tight end Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift celebrate the Chiefs’ victory over the Buffalo Bills in the AFC Championship on Jan. 26, 2025, in Kansas City, Mo.
(Charlie Riedel / Associated Press)
“I believe it can,” said Lee Berke, president of LHB Sports, Entertainment & Media, noting the lift the NFL ratings have seen this season as viewing information from set-top devices and internet connected televisions in 45 million households are now included in Nielsen’s audience measurement.
“It’s definitely showing up and bumping up ratings throughout the year for the NFL,” Berke said.
A recent report from the Video Advertising Bureau found that the new measurement from Nielsen has boosted ratings for prime time NFL games in the mid-to-high single digit percentages.
Other changes to Nielsen’s measurement in recent years have given the Super Bowl a boost. While surpassing 100 million was once a reasonable goal, the numbers started climbing above that threshold since out-of-home viewing was added in 2021.
History is on the side of a robust audience number this year. The last time the Patriots faced the Seahawks in 2015, the NBC telecast set a viewership record at the time of 114.4 million. Fans watching Sunday can expect to see clips of Malcolm Butler’s interception at the goal line that helped give Tom Brady’s Patriots the win that year.
But NBC doesn’t need a record audience number for the Super Bowl to be a financial success. A robust TV advertising marketplace helped the network sell out the game at a record average of $8 million per 30-second spot, with some going for $10 million.
NBC has also sold spots that will air only on its Peacock streaming platform. The network pulled in the range of $3 million a spot, significantly above the $2 million Fox took in for ads last year when the game was streamed on its Tubi service.
This year NBC was able to use Super Bowl LX to drive ad sales for its coverage of the Winter Olympic Games in Milan that begin Friday and run through Feb. 22, (which is also sold out). The network also has the NBA All-Star Game at the Intuit Dome in Inglewood on Feb. 14, which is why Mike Cavanaugh, co-chief executive of NBCU parent Comcast, recently described February as “the most consequential month in live sports history.”
In 2022, NBC’s combination of both the Winter Olympics and the Super Bowl, accounted for $1.5 billion in revenue according to Comcast’s earnings report, a number the company will likely surpass this year. The company isn’t commenting on revenue but has said it expects to set a record for Super Bowl ad revenue.
Mark Marshall, chairman of global advertising sales and partnerships for NBCUniversal, said 70% of the companies in the Super Bowl are also running commercials in the Olympics.
In previous decades, a Super Bowl commercial was an event in itself with the reveal happening on the telecast. But Marshall noted that, as part of a larger marketing effort, advertising campaigns are now introduced with teasers ahead of the telecast and many get a full preview online.
This year, NBCU was able to offer the Olympics to help marketers connect with more consumers.
“We told advertisers ‘you’re going to spend eight figures (on producing a commercial) — extend the reach of that,” Marshall said.
Technology companies make up the largest share of advertisers. Several AI companies, including Anthropic and Genspark, will be first-time Super Bowl ad buyers. Viewers will also see returning entries from Google, Meta, Wix and Amazon, which will air a spot for its Alexa device.
While there are the usual array of snack food and soft drink companies that will appearin the commercial breaks, viewers will also see a spurt in pharmaceutical ads. Marshall said the category has increased its presence on NFL games. The Super Bowl spots will focus on a message of “wellness,” rather than straight ahead product spots with disclaimers listing unpleasant drug side effects.
Marshall said NBCU does not expect the announced alternative halftime show presented by Turning Point USA to have an impact on the ratings. A concert featuring Kid Rock and lesser known country artists Brantley Gilbert, Lee Brice and Gabby Barrett, will stream on YouTube, X, Rumble and several right-wing TV channels.
The concert promoted by the right-wing group founded by the late Charlie Kirk and now run by his widow Erika is in response to conservatives outraged over the NFL’s selection of Grammy-winning music superstar Bad Bunny, who sings primarily in Spanish, as the halftime act. (President Trump called the decision “terrible” and is skipping the game.)
But the league has not wavered for a moment amid the blowback, as it seeks to expand its global reach by having the most streamed artist in the world on the stage of its marquee event.
The only effective counter-programming gimmick against the Super Bowl halftime show came in 1992. Fox, still an upstart network, ran a live edition of its sketch comedy show “In Living Color” against the halftime of the CBS telecast of Super Bowl XXVI, which featured ice skaters Dorothy Hamill and Brian Boitano.
The pronounced dip in viewership prompted the NFL to sign Michael Jackson as the halftime act in 1993. The game saw a significant ratings boost and the league has booked contemporary music acts for the game ever since.
CBS News has no plans to drop health guru Peter Attia from his contributor role after his emails to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein surfaced last week.
Attia was among the 19 contributors named by CBS News Editor-in-chief Bari Weiss when she addressed staff about her future plans for the network on Jan. 28.
Two days later, Attia showed up in the latest batch of files on Epstein. A Stanford-trained physician who has gained prominence for his expertise in longevity medicine, Attia had a number of email exchanges with Epstein, including a crude discussion about female genitalia.
Another message showed Attia expressing dismay that he could not discuss Epstein’s activities. “You [know] the biggest problem with becoming friends with you? The life you lead is so outrageous, and yet I can’t tell a soul …” Attia wrote.
In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges of soliciting prostitution, including from a minor. He was and found dead in his jail cell in 2019, about a month after being arrested on federal sex-trafficking charges
Conduct such as Attia’s association with Epstein would typically be grounds for a network news organization to cut ties with an individual, especially one who is not a full-time employee. Contributors are usually paid by the appearance.
But Weiss is said to be opposed to cutting Attia, according to two people familiar with her thinking. As founder of the digital news site The Free Press and as an opinion writer, Weiss spoke out against so called cancel culture and does not want to be seen as reacting to the Epstein frenzy.
Weiss joined CBS News in October after parent company Paramount acquired The Free Press, which gained a rabid following due to its willingness to criticize the political left. She has been a polarizing figure since taking editorial control of CBS News, making moves that some insiders believe are aimed at pleasing President Trump, such as delaying a “60 Minutes” story on the treatment of undocumented migrants being held in El Salvador.
CBS News has not publicly commented on Attia’s status.
Two companies have dropped Attia since the Epstein files surfaced. AGI, a company that makes powdered supplements, has dropped him as a scientific adviser. He has also stepped away from his role as chief science officer for David, a protein bar maker.
CBS News is pulling a “60 Minutes” profile of Attia that first aired in October. The segment was scheduled to re-air Sunday on a “60 Minutes” episode made up of repeats, which the program typically runs when the Super Bowl telecast is on a rival network.
Insiders say even if CBS News’ ties to Attia are not publicly severed, it’s unlikely he will ever be seen on the air. Health-related segments on TV news typically come with sponsors attached. It’s hard to imagine any advertiser will want their commercials running adjacent to a former Epstein pal.
In a Monday post on X, Attia apologized for his interactions with Epstein. He said he had not been involved in any criminal activity and had never visited Epstein’s island.
“I apologize and regret putting myself in a position where emails, some of them embarrassing, tasteless, and indefensible, are now public, and that is on me,” Attia wrote. “I accept that reality and the humiliation that comes with it.”
Attia wrote the best-selling book “Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity” and hosts a popular podcast. His company, Early Medical, offers a program that teaches people to live healthier as they age.
For years at CNN, Don Lemon had been a thorn in the side of President Trump, frequently taking him to task during his first term over his comments about immigrants and other matters.
On Friday, the former CNN anchor — now an independent journalist who hosts his own YouTube show — was in a Los Angeles federal courtroom and charged with conspiracy and interfering with the First Amendment rights of worshippers during the Jan. 18 protest at the Cities Church in St. Paul.
Lemon was arrested by federal agents in Los Angeles on Friday, along with a second journalist and two of the participants in the protest of the federal government’s immigration enforcement tactics in Minneapolis.
Lemon identified himself at the protest as a journalist. His attorney said in a statement Lemon’s work was “constitutionally protected.”
“I have spent my entire career covering the news,” Lemon told reporters after he was released on his own recognizance Friday afternoon. “I will not stop now. There is no more important time than right now, this very moment, for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable. Again, I will not stop now. I will not stop, ever.”
The scene of a reporter standing before a judge and facing federal charges for doing his job once seemed unimaginable in the U.S.
The arrest marked an extraordinary escalation in the Trump administration’s frayed relations with the news media and journalists.
Earlier this month, the FBI seized the devices of Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson in a pre-dawn raid as part of an investigation into a contractor who has been charged with sharing classified information. Such a seizure is a very rare occurrence in the U.S.
Last spring, the Associated Press was banned from the White House. The AP sued White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and two other administration officials, demanding reinstatement.
Even the Committee to Protect Journalists, an organization that monitors and honors reporters imprisoned by authoritarian government regimes overseas, felt compelled to weigh in on Lemon’s arrest.
“As an international organization, we know that the treatment of journalists is a leading indicator of the condition of a country’s democracy,” CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg said in a statement. “These arrests are just the latest in a string of egregious and escalating threats to the press in the United States — and an attack on people’s right to know.”
For Lemon, 59, it’s another chapter in a career that has undergone a major reinvention in the last 10 years, largely due to his harsh takes on Trump and the boundary-pushing moves of his administration. His journey has been fraught, occasionally making him the center of the stories he covers.
“He has a finely honed sense of what people are talking about and where the action is, and he heads straight for it in a good way,” said Jonathan Wald, a veteran TV producer who has worked with Lemon over the years.
A Louisiana native, Lemon began his career in local TV news, working at the Fox-owned station in New York and then NBC’s WMAQ in Chicago where he got into trouble with management. Robert Feder, a longtime media columnist in Chicago, recalled how Lemon was suspended by his station for refusing to cover a crime story which he felt was beneath him.
“A memorable headline from that era was ‘Lemon in Hot Water,’ ” Feder said.
But Lemon’s good looks and smooth delivery helped him move to CNN in 2006, where his work was not always well-received. He took over the prime time program “CNN Tonight” in 2014 and became part of the network’s almost obsessive coverage of the missing Malaysian Airlines Flight 370. (Lemon was ridiculed for asking an aviation analyst if the plane might have been sucked into a black hole).
Like a number of other TV journalists, Lemon found his voice after Trump’s ascension to the White House. He injected more commentary into “CNN Tonight,” calling Trump a racist after the president made a remark in the Oval Office about immigrants coming from “shit hole countries” to the U.S.
After George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis in May 2020, Lemon’s status as the lone Black prime time anchor on cable news made his program a gathering place for the national discussion about race. His ratings surged, giving CNN its largest 10 p.m. audience in history with 2.4 million viewers that month.
Lemon’s candid talk about race relations and criticism of Trump made him a target of the president’s social media missives. In a 2020 interview, Lemon told the Times that he had to learn to live with threats on his life from Trump supporters.
“It’s garnered me a lot of enemies,” he said. “A lot of them in person as well. I have to watch my back over it.”
Lemon never let up, but CNN management had other ideas. After Warner Bros. Discovery took control of CNN in 2022, Chief Executive David Zaslav said the network had moved too far to the political left in its coverage and called for more representation of conservative voices.
Following the takeover, Lemon was moved out of prime time and onto a new morning program — a format where CNN has never been successful over its four decade-plus history.
Lemon’s “CNN Tonight” program was built around his scripted commentaries and like-minded guests. Delivering off-the-cuff banter in reaction to news of the moment — a requirement for morning TV news — was not his strong suit.
Lemon had a poor relationship with his co-anchors Poppy Harlow and Kaitlin Collins. The tensions came to a head in Feb. 2023 after an ill-advised remark he made about then Republican presidential contender Nikki Haley.
Lemon attempted to critique Haley’s statements that political leaders over the age of 75 should undergo competency testing.
“All the talk about age makes me uncomfortable — I think it’s a wrong road to go down,” Lemon began. “She says politicians, or something, are not in their prime. Nikki Haley isn’t in her prime — sorry — when a woman is considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s, maybe 40s.”
Harlow quickly interjected, repeatedly asking Lemon a couple of times, “Prime for what?” Lemon told his female co-anchors to “Google it.” It was one of several sexist remarks he made on the program.
Lemon was pulled from the air and forced to apologize to colleagues, some of whom had called for his dismissal. He was fired in April 2023 on the same day Fox News removed Tucker Carlson .
Lemon was paid out his lucrative CNN contract and went on to become one of the first traditional TV journalists to go independent and produce his own program for distribution on social media platforms.
“Others might have cowered or taken time to regroup and figure out what they should do,” said Wald. “He had little choice but to toil ahead.”
Lemon first signed with X in 2024 to distribute his program as the platform made a push into longer form video. The business relationship ended shortly after new X owner Elon Musk sat down for an interview with Lemon.
Musk agreed to the high-profile chat with no restrictions, but was unhappy with the line of questioning. “His approach was basically ‘CNN but on social media,’ which doesn’t work, as evidenced by the fact that CNN is dying,” Musk wrote.
An unfazed Lemon forged ahead and made his daily program available on YouTube, where it has 1.3 million subscribers, and other platforms. He has a small staff that handles production and online audience engagement. In addition to ad revenue from YouTube, the program has signed its own sponsors.
While legacy media outlets have become more conscious of running afoul of Trump, who has threatened the broadcast TV licenses of networks that make him unhappy with their coverage, independent journalists such as Lemon and his former CNN colleague Jim Acosta, have doubled down in their aggressive analysis of the administration.
Friends describe Lemon as relentless, channeling every attempt to hold him back into motivation to push harder. “You tell him ‘you can’t do it,’ he just wants to do it more,” said one close associate.
Wald said independent conservative journalists should be wary of Lemon’s arrest.
“If I’m a conservative blogger, influencer, or YouTube creator type, I would be worried that when the administration changes, they can be next,” Wald said. “So people should be careful what they wish for here.”
Before arriving at CBS News in October to become editor in chief, Bari Weiss had never been inside a television control room.
But on Tuesday, she presented her plan for taking the storied news division forward after a series of moves that has damaged its standing among viewers, failed to improve ratings, lowered internal morale and generated highly negative press coverage.
Weiss, addressing the staff gathered at the CBS Broadcast Center in Manhattan, reached out to those who have not been impressed with what they have seen so far. “I’m not going to stand up here today and ask for your trust,” she said, according to a transcript provided by CBS News. “I’m going to earn it, just like we have to do with our viewers.”
The statement was an acknowledgment that the early days of Weiss’ tenure have not been smooth. Weiss has dealt with her own lack of familiarity with TV news procedures, the entrenched culture of a legacy media institution and suspicion that partisan politics are driving changes. The town hall-style meeting was an attempt at a reset.
Weiss fought the claims that her mandate at CBS News is to provide friendlier coverage to the Trump administration as parent company Paramount pursues an acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. She said she has never discussed CBS News coverage of the White House with Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison, to whom she reports.
Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison attends the premiere of “Ghosted” at AMC Lincoln Square in New York in April 2023.
(Evan Agostini/Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
“I’m here to do one thing,” Weiss said. “It’s not to be a mouthpiece for anybody. It’s simply to be a mouthpiece for fairness and the pursuit of truth.”
She told employees her business goal for CBS News is to expand its reach on digital platforms.
“We are not doing enough to meet audiences where they are, so they are leaving us,” she said, adding that the network’s strategy until now has been “to cling to the audience that remains on broadcast television. If we stick to that strategy, we’re toast.”
Weiss said she wants to focus on expanding the most successful CBS News programs — “60 Minutes,” “CBS Sunday Morning” and true crime magazine “48 Hours” to other platforms, including podcasts, newsletters and live events. “We need to shift to a streaming mentality immediately,” she said, adding that “our competitors are not just the other broadcast networks.
The pronouncement — which could have been made five to 10 years ago — was welcomed by some CBS News employees who believe the operation has lagged in using its resources to expand beyond traditional TV. Overall, they were encouraged by Weiss’ remarks.
“She went a good way to bring people together,” said one attendee. “That was a good start.”
One question posed to Weiss, which is likely to loom over her tenure, is how much time does CBS News have to replace the substantial revenue still generated by traditional TV with digital enterprises. Ad rates for digital platforms are substantially lower than those for TV, which means greater dependence on subscriptions and other revenue sources.
Weiss did not provide any specifics on the level of investment for the new initiatives. “The emphasis going forward is going to be building things that people are ultimately willing to pay for,” she said.
Weiss said the network is recruiting “fresh young talent” that will focus on reporting first through social media, “but will appear everywhere else too.” She showed three recent hires based in London, Kyiv and New York who deliver their stories across different platforms using their iPhones.
Weiss also announced the hiring of 19 new contributors, several of whom have already appeared on the Free Press, the digital news site that CBS News parent Paramount acquired as part of the deal to bring her into the company.
The dependence on contributors, who are not employees but paid for their TV appearances, is commonly used on cable news networks that need to fill hours of programming.
Weiss has acknowledged to colleagues that she’s not familiar with the process of moving the assembly line of stories from the assignment stage, through the reporting and editing process and onto a schedule of programs, some of which run 365 days a year.
Her lack of experience was glaring in her handling of “60 Minutes,” the network’s most prestigious and profitable program. CBS News staffers were stunned when she decided to pull a segment on the abuses at an El Salvador prison used by the U.S. government to detain undocumented immigrants from Venezuela.
“CBS Evening News” anchor Tony Dokoupil and the network’s chief national correspondent Matt Gutman.
(CBS News)
The story had been researched and reported for months by correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi and fully vetted by the standards department when Weiss yanked it one day before its originally scheduled Dec. 21 air date. Alfonsi called the move political and the conflict added to the narrative that Weiss is trying to placate the White House.
Weiss insisted Alfonsi’s story needed more reporting including an interview with an administration official, even though the White House had already declined requests to participate. The segment ran a month later with only minor additions to the reporting which executives inside the news division say was not worth the public drama created by Weiss’ editorial decision.
At the meeting, Weiss acknowledged she would have approached the matter differently but defended her intent.
“It’s always gonna be my prerogative as editor of this newsroom to say that I want more information, and to push to get more information,” she said. “Now, am I ever going to hold something again after it has been put out there with promos? I don’t want to make that exact same decision again, no I do not.”
Weiss added that Paramount management had no influence on her decision to hold Alfonsi’s story. “I wanna just say this as plainly and clearly as possible,” she said. “I was not pressured by David Ellison or anyone else.”
She said the journalism standards at the network have not changed since she arrived, but believed the division has been more welcoming to a wider range of viewpoints.
“I don’t think a year ago CBS News would’ve had [former National Rifle Assn. spokesperson] Dana Loesch, let’s say, on the morning show,” Weiss said. “I think that’s something to be proud of.”
Weiss praised the revamped “CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil” — with a new anchor she handpicked, even though critics have been harsh and the ratings have slipped. All three of the major network evening newscasts are down in January compared to a year ago, but CBS is off the most at around 20%.
Segments on the program, such as Dokoupil’s frothy tribute to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and a brief item on the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection in Washington that had President Trump calling it the fault of the Capitol police, were widely panned. But the attention has died down as the program has settled into being a straight-ahead newscast.
While the fiascoes involving “60 Minutes” or the first week of the “CBS Evening News” have been demoralizing, some journalists in the division are still hopeful Weiss can be a catalyst for change and want her to succeed.
But her rocky start will be tough to turn around according to Tom Bettag, a former network news producer who is now a lecturer at the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism.
“Weiss started off so miserably with ’60 Minutes’ and the Dokoupil launch, that you wonder if she can redeem herself,” Bettag said. “You only get one chance to make a first impression.”
Weiss isn’t the first executive to be put in charge of a TV news operation without any hands-on experience. It was not easy for the others, either.
Michael Gartner, a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper editor was appointed to oversee NBC News in the mid-1980s. During his turbulent five-year tenure, he struggled with talent egos as he tried to get costs under control. Walter Isaacson came from Time magazine to run CNN in 2001. He was gone after 18 months, expressing bewilderment over the public scrutiny of every network move.
Weiss’ previous management experience was running the Free Press, which has a staff of 60 compared to the sprawling CBS News operation with more than 1,200 employees around the world.
Weiss is also an anomaly as she comes to the job with an established point of view. Her journalism career was as an opinion writer before she launched the Free Press. The site gained a following for its criticism of the progressive left and purveyors of so-called “woke” policies.
Weiss has been vocal in telling CBS News employees that the public has less trust in legacy media, an assertion that is often pushed by Trump and his supporters. (She told the meeting that the network needs to target “independents … those who want to equip themselves with all the facts, who are curious to hear what’s going on, even if it offends their sensibilities.”)
Weiss carries that agenda while she tries to overcome the whispers of “she’s not one of us” at CBS News, which even loyal insiders believe leans too heavily on its storied history defined by 20th century journalism icons such as Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow.
“I think this place has allowed the ghosts of the past to walk these halls a little too much,” one CBS News journalist said. “They need to be acknowledged, but not obsessed over every day. The New York Yankees don’t sit around dwelling on Babe Ruth every day. They focus on winning.”
While “60 Minutes” and “CBS Evening News” are the editorial backbone of the division and are getting the bulk of Weiss’ attention, the division also has to chart a future course for “CBS Mornings,” a major revenue generator. Co-host Gayle King’s contract is up in May and last year there were leaks to an industry trade suggesting that Paramount wants her to return in another role and presumably a lower salary.
“CBS Mornings” is in third place behind ABC’s “Good Morning America” and NBC’s “Today,” but still has a following and King is the most recognizable star in the news division. Morning show viewing is habitual and a change in the host chair could lead King’s fans to abandon the program. Once viewers leave, it’s hard to get them back, especially in today’s fragmented media environment where consumers have a seemingly endless array of alternatives.
At the town hall, Weiss gave a positive shout-out to King, who is angry over the press reports. “I’ve had people come and pet me like a puppy and say, ‘I’m sorry that you’re leaving CBS, I won’t watch those guys anymore,’” King said.
“I just want everyone here to know that she’s absolutely beloved,” Weiss said. “And we see her long into the future here at CBS.”
People close to the morning program who were not authorized to comment publicly believe King would return for another contract. But the network is already preparing for the future if King does depart.
Adriana Diaz and Kelly O’Grady were named co-hosts of “CBS Saturday Morning” and will be the principal fill-ins for King on the weekday program, clearly an attempt to get them familiar with the audience. “It’s a very explicit attempt to start building a bench,” said one insider.
Before the town hall meeting on Tuesday, many CBS News veterans were frustrated that Weiss had not addressed the entire division during the first three months of her tenure. King, who told colleagues she was impressed overall with the presentation, told Weiss they needed to meet sooner.
“For many people — they’ve never even heard your freakin’ voice,” King said. “So it’s good to hear, to see you’re a real person and this is what you want.”
