If Paramount Skydance’s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery goes through, then Paramount’s CBS News division will be corporate siblings with WBD’s CNN news organization. And star CNN anchor Anderson Cooper is reportedly disinclined to work for CBS News boss Bari Weiss after overlapping with her during his 60 Minutes tenure.
In a new report about CNN staffers’ jitters about the pending merger, The New York Times cites two sources who say Cooper told CNN colleagues he doesn’t want to work for Weiss.
Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison, an ally of President Donald Trump, installed Weiss as CBS News’ editor-in-chief in October 2025, despite her lack of broadcast journalism experience. Since then, Weiss has reshaped longtime CBS News franchises, reworking CBS Evening News to controversial effect and firing so many 60 Minutes employees that then-correspondent Scott Pelley accused her of “murdering” the newsmagazine.
Cooper left 60 Minutes in April after 20 years of serving as a correspondent. And though he didn’t mention Weiss in his farewell segment, he did emphasize the show’s need for independence, his comments coming as several 60 Minutes colleagues have accused Weiss of editorial interference.
“I hope 60 Minutes remains 60 Minutes,” Cooper said in that segment. “There’s very few things that have been around as long as 60 Minutes has and maintained the quality that it has. And things can always evolve and change, and I think that’s awesome. And things should evolve and change, but I hope the core of what 60 Minutes is always remains.”
According to Oliver Darcy’s Status newsletter, Weiss was “blindsided” and “furious” about Cooper’s comments. Sources also told Darcy that Cooper wasn’t a fan of the “rightward direction” of CBS News in the Weiss era.
According to the new Times report, Ellison is considering putting Weiss in charge of CNN or pairing her with a more experienced TV executive. The report also said that Mark Thompson, currently CNN’s chief executive, hadn’t heard from Ellison’s team about his job status post-merger and that Thompson recently told Paramount officials that he wouldn’t share oversight of CNN with another exec.
Tech journalist Kara Swisher told the Times she wouldn’t continue working for CNN if Ellison brings in someone to replace Thompson, citing the CBS News chaos. “So far, there’s nothing I’ve seen that indicates that they’re serious about creating a modern digital news organization,” she said.
