Cecilia Vega, the former 60 Minutes correspondent fired from CBS News in May, is speaking out about what she describes as pressure from network executives to alter segments in ways she says were not supported by evidence.
Vega made her allegations Thursday at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists conference in an interview with ABC News correspondent John Quiñones. According to The Hollywood Reporter, which also cited reporting by The New York Times, Vega said higher-ups requested specific changes to three of her segments this year, none of which made it to air.
"I've gone head-to-head with editors for 25 years in this business," she said at the conference. "But never in my career, until now, have I felt that those edits, that those suggestions, came from a place of misinformation or politics."
In one instance, Vega said executives asked her to include video of protesters attacking people they believed were Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents for a January segment about ICE, and also to include footage of a police chief rolling his eyes during a news conference. Vega said she could not find video of either incident.
For a February segment about poverty in West Virginia, she said she was asked to mention Vice President J.D. Vance because he had previously written about poverty in Ohio. Vega said the piece was not focused on politicians or political voices. A third requested change involved adding a line she described as "an administration talking point" about Iran being outgunned by the United States and Israel.
Vega had previously addressed these issues in a statement after her firing. "Let's call this what it is: censorship, both imposed and self-driven," she wrote at the time. "It is dangerous for the show and dangerous for democracy." At the time, a CBS News spokesperson responded by saying her claims were "not based in reality."
Vega was one of several prominent 60 Minutes figures dismissed as part of a major overhaul led by CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss. Executive producer Tanya Simon and journalists Scott Pelley and Sharyn Alfonsi were also let go. Pelley, after being fired, publicly accused Weiss of "incompetence and unprofessionalism" and claimed CBS News management "instructed me to inject falsehood" into the program. The Hollywood Reporter has reached out to CBS News for comment on Vega's latest statements.
