CBS 60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi raged against the network’s Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss when she delayed her story on how the Trump administration deported illegal immigrants from Venezuela to a “notorious” prison in El Salvador. Weiss wanted more reporting and more rebuttal from the Trump administration in it. "If the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a 'kill switch' for any reporting they find inconvenient,” Alfonsi complained in a memo leaked to the media. “We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state.” The targets of a story shouldn’t have a veto, but it’s not unreasonable to let them rebut "notorious" allegations. The hilarious piece of this argument is that 60 Minutes deserves the term “investigative powerhouse.” Back on February 17, Alfonsi gushed over German officials fining and jailing people for “hate speech” on the internet. Alfonsi let them claim that punishing people for what they say online is “protecting democracy and discourse by introducing a touch of German order to the unruly world wide web.” She asked one censor: “You're doing all this work. You're launching all these investigations. You're fining people, sometimes putting them in jail. Does it make a difference if it's a worldwide web and there's a lotta hate out there?” This is being a “stenographer for the state,” literally. Scott Pelley’s interviews with President Biden did not demonstrate an “investigative powerhouse” at work. In 2022, Pelley warmly nudged Biden: “You have lived a long life of triumph and tragedy. In November, you'll be 80. And I wonder what it is that keeps you in the arena.” Seconds later, Biden pulled out his rosary ring so Pelley could tout him as "Catholic and devout." In October of 2023, he helped paint Biden as a constructive foreign-policy player. Pelley told viewers the president was “asking for billions of dollars for Israel and Ukraine, Congress is paralyzed. Hard-right Republicans are obstructing the election of a Speaker of the House.” He asked Biden: “Does the dysfunction that we've seen in Congress increase the danger in the world?” Why, yes, Biden replied, the Republicans are terrible. Biden was painted as the family man who visited German death camps: "Mr. Biden told us images of October 7th reminded him of the Holocaust—which he has studied-- taking his family to the Dachau death camp in Germany. This is 2015, the man in the wheelchair is a Dachau survivor. Behind Mr. Biden is the president's granddaughter." It’s stenography. Two weeks earlier, Scott Pelley gently asked Attorney General Merrick Garland about how nonpartisan he was. He even asked: “Two of your ancestors were murdered in the Holocaust. Is that why you devoted yourself to the law?”  At the end, Pelley added, “if democracy is an emotional subject for Merrick Garland, maybe it's because he has witnessed how suddenly it can be threatened, in Oklahoma City [in 1995] and Washington D.C. [January 6].” Pelley asked Garland "when the history of this extraordinary time is written, what is the best that Merrick Garland can hope for?” For many years now, 60 Minutes has painted itself as an “investigative powerhouse” when it’s going after Republicans, but they often sound like their show could be called “Syrupy Minutes” when they’re interviewing their ideological allies, from the Clintons to Obama and Biden. This is why they are offended by the oversight of Bari Weiss. She represents those repulsive people who expect some fraction of balance or fairness from CBS. They don’t want any “corporate interference” in the machinations of their propaganda factory.

Sharyn Alfonsi’s hack job of a CECOT feature for 60 Minutes, pulled due to what could be charitably described as deficient reporting, has triggered a firestorm within the elitist media. But that’s not all. The report has now also triggered an “overhaul” of standards and procedures at CBS and 60 Minutes. Per Axios: CBS News' new editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is planning to create a masthead for the broadcaster as part of a broader overhaul of standards and procedures, according to a source familiar with her plans. Why it matters: The masthead is meant to drive a more streamlined hierarchy and set of processes across show and news gathering teams that are intended to prevent disparate editorial procedures and standards. CBS News, and 60 Minutes in particular, was broken long before Weiss took over. Alfonsi is the poster child of that brokenness, what with such previous lowlights as the attempted smear of Gov. Ron DeSantis using selectively edited footage, and her cheering of German censorship.  A “broader overhaul of standards and procedures” is certainly welcome at CBS, but it should have come well before the CECOT fiasco.  Our own Curtis Houck saw and reviewed the pulled report, chronicled its deficiencies here, and summed it thusly: Having wasted over 13 minutes of our time on a grim prison at least some Americans are unlikely to shed any tears over, Alfonsi offered the lie about DHS ignoring her and ended by revealing 252 Venezuelan men who spent time at CECOT were released and “sent back to Caracas in exchange for 10 Americans that had been imprisoned in Venezuela” while other illegal immigrants could be deported “to other so-called third countries” with “well-documented histories of torturing prisoners.” The lie about the administration responding is a problem: According to a source familiar with the "60 Minutes" team's correspondence with the administration, journalists reached out to press officials at the White House, State Department and DHS, all of which provided comment to CBS News ahead of the piece's anticipated run date. None of those comments, which varied in length and substance, were included in the piece, which has been made public from a recording that was distributed via an app owned by Global TV, which airs "60 Minutes" in Canada. The item further goes on to specify that DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin provided a 300-word statement for the record, which neither ran nor was cited in the 60 Minutes report. That’s a huge problem when attempting to create a narrative about no one being available to speak on the record, in defense of a report that got yanked for deficient reporting. Had Alfonsi merely committed deficient reporting and kept a subsequent low profile, perhaps this would not be such a vocal issue. But she then decided to insulate herself from the ensuing blowback and do so in the most insurrectiony way: by sending and publishing an inflammatory email defending the piece, which then riled up the entire chattering class.  Now, as a result, there will be increased oversight of CBS News. Long ovedue, if you ask us.     

It must be nice to be a Democrat. You can just speculate wildly about your political opponents, and the corporate media will launder whatever you say into a legitimate news item. When a few Congressional Democrats pontificated that the September 2, 2025 U.S. “double tap” drug boat strike somehow constituted a “war crime,” the left-wing TV news media eagerly amplified the claim. But almost without exception, journalists were careful not to mention that the original accusation had originated from a handful of Democrats. Quotes from lawmakers often add useful information to a news report. They can elucidate what the point of contention is on a political issue, or they can help the audience decode along what lines the partisan divide lies for a given topic. But the partisan identity of the speaker is absolutely vital context. Without it, viewers have no means of distinguishing between claims made by a seasoned expert, and those originating from (for example) a low-level Democratic Congressman’s press office. And in fact, that’s precisely why that context keeps getting left out of all the reports. The corporate media have laundered a partisan talking point into not just a legitimate detail, but in fact the defining feature of a news item.  Thus, a few Democrats speculating without evidence that the other party committed a “war crime” has morphed into: “Some are calling this a war crime.”

The walls are “caving in” on Democrat Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) announced Friday, updating his committee’s probe of the billion-dollar fraud scandal uncovered in the state. In an interview on Fox News Channel, Chairman Comer identified the state whistleblowers who exposed the fraud as “the most important people” he expects to testify before Congress. After Gov. Walz ignored their warnings “for years,” they’ve now stepped forward to alert the entire country of the fraud that was taking place, Comer said: "The most important people are the state whistleblowers, the state employees who put that tweet out that we all are familiar with, a few weeks ago, that alerted America to the massive fraud. “These state employees also alleged that they had warned both Governor Walz and attorney general Ellison for years that this fraud was occurring and yet nothing was taking place. “So, we are going to bring the state employees in. We are going to get their sworn testimony. We appreciate their bravery in coming forward.” “We’re also going to bring in state lawmakers and Minnesota mayors – because the walls are caving in on Tim Walz,” the Oversight chairman said, explaining the harm the fraud inflicted on Minnesota’s citizens: “This massive amount of fraud is affecting and impacting every citizen in Minnesota because they’re having to cut services because so much of the money for social programs was wasted and defrauded by this Somali population.” Comer detailed a plan to “follow the money,” then identify and hold accountable those responsible for the fraud: “We’re going to try to identify who was responsible for this. We’re going to try to identify banks that we can subpoena their bank records so we can follow the money to see how much was taken, who took it, and then who do we need to hold accountable and hopefully we’ll have some criminal referrals at the end of the investigation.” Because Walz ignored warnings, refused to hold the fraudsters accountable and won’t accept responsibility, U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Kelly Loeffler said Friday that she is ending funding to his state. “Today, I informed Governor Tim Walz that SBA is halting $5.5 million in annual funding to Minnesota pending further review,” Loeffler announced in a social media post sharing her letter to Walz and describing millions of dollars of additional potential fraud: “This action follows alarming findings: individuals indicted in the $1 billion Somali fraud scheme also received at least $3 million in PPP (Paycheck Protection Program) loans, and SBA has since identified 13,600 additional PPP loans in Minnesota - totaling $430 million - suspected as fraudulent.” “With dozens of investigations underway, the conclusion is unavoidable: Minnesota cannot be trusted to administer federal tax dollars,” the SBA administrator concluded. “Its socialist welfare system has enabled fraud at industrial scale, at the expense of honest Americans - and these are the consequences.” Read more: pic.twitter.com/EBgSjmBq7q — Kelly Loeffler (@SBA_Kelly) December 23, 2025  

On Monday night, the now-infamous 60 Minutes segment pulled by editor-in-chief Bari Weiss seemed to have self-deported and aired up in Canada on Global TV, one of its broadcast networks. With it now available to the masses (thanks to social media), we can now give it a full viewing and not a she-said, she-said between Weiss and correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi. Spoiler alert: the piece was biased as hell, lacking the balance and nuance Weiss asked for. Between the two sympathetic interview subjects, the use of a far-left so-called human rights group, lying about the administration’s lack of responses to comment requests, and chatting it up with Berkeley students, Alfonsi’s piece had it all. Alfonsi opened with snide commentaries and lamenting the two interviewed “described torture, sexual, and physical abuse inside CENCOT”: The Sharyn Alfonsi piece on CECOT was biased as hell and par for the course from the show @theMRC penned a special report on back in the Obama years called Syrupy Minutes. Alfonsi started with zero attempt at explaining the administration’s position, using a throwaway sentence… pic.twitter.com/rwj10lzajT — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 23, 2025   The person above was Luis Munoz Pinto, whom Alfonsi said is a Colombian national and “was a college student in repressive Venezuela and hoped to seek asylum in the United States in 2024,” and “waited in Mexico until his scheduled appointment with U.S. Customs and Border Protection in California,” which she said was merely CBP arresting Pinto and shipping him off to hell. Asked if he had a criminal record, Pinto insisted he had “nothing” and not “even...a traffic ticket,” which was enough for Alfonsi to declare him squeaky clean. “He says he spent six months locked up in the U.S. waiting for a decision on his asylum case when he was deported, one of 252 Venezuelans sent to CECOT between March and April. Inside, he says their hands and feet were tied, forced to their knees, their heads were shaved,” she added. What followed were more soundbites from Pinto (who, of course, didn’t speak any English): PINTO [VOICE OF TRANSLATOR]: There was blood everywhere, screams, people crying, people who couldn’t take it and were urinating and vomiting on themselves. When you get there, you already know you’re in hell. You don’t need anyone else to tell you. ALFONSI: He says the guards began savagely beating them with their fists and batons. [TO PINTO] Tell me about what they did to you personally. PINTO [VOICE OF TRANSLATOR]: Four guards grabbed me and they beat me until I bled to the point of agony. They knocked our faces against the wall. That was when they broke one of my teeth. Having led with the shock value to degrade the administration, Alfonsi finally gave backstory to “CECOT...build in 2022 as a key part of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele’s sweeping anti-gang crackdown” and “designed to hold 40,000 inmates” with “cramped cells where metal bunks are stacked four high” plus “no mattresses or sheets” or “access to the outdoors.” Predictably holding up the Biden administration’s denunciations of CECOT and Bukele being granted an April visit to the White House, Alfonsi conceded the U.S. had sent illegal immigrants there as part of “a deal to pay El Salvador $4.7 million to house Venezuelan deportees[.]” In this portion of the story was what Alfonsi probably thought passed as presenting the other side as she ran sound of President Trump from Bukele’s April 14 visit as well as White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt defending the CECOT deal on April 17. Later in the story, she claimed “[t]he Department of Homeland Security declined our request for an interview and referred all questions about CECOT to El Salvador,” but Axios’s Sara Fischer reported Monday night that the “[White House], State Dept and DHS all provided on record comment in response to CBS News journalists’ request for comment ahead of the segment.” Seeing as how “[n]one of those comments made the air,” we can say Alfonsi and her team are guilty of a pants-on-fire lie. Instead, Alfonsi gave wide latitude to an Americas expert with the Soros-funded Human Rights Watch, which are the same people who want you to believe Gazans are the ones being slaughtered in a genocide by Israelis, not the other way around (click “expand”): ALFONSI [TO PAPPIER]: The U.S. government said these people are the worst of the worst. PAPPIER: These people are migrants, and the sad reality is that the U.S. government tried to make an example out of them. They sent them to a place where they were likely to be tortured, to send migrants across Latin America the message that they should not come to the United States. ALFONSI: Juan Pappier is a deputy director at the nonprofit Human Rights Watch. In an 81-page report released in November, the organization concluded there was systematic torture and other abuses at SCOTT, and that nearly half of the Venezuelans the U.S. sent there had no criminal history. Only eight of the men had been convicted of a violent or potentially violent offense. [TO PAPPIER] How do you know they weren’t gang members? PAPPIER: We cross referenced federal databases, databases in all 50 states in the United States, and also obtained criminal records in Venezuela and in the countries where these people lived. And the information we obtained in the United States is based on data provided by ICE. ALFONSI [TO PAPPIER]: So, ICE’s own records said? PAPPIER: ICE’s own records say that only three precent of them had been sentenced for a violent or potentially violent crime. ALFONSI: 60 Minutes reviewed the available ICE data. It confirms the findings of Human Rights Watch. It shows 70 men had pending criminal charges in the U.S., which could include immigration violations. We don’t know because the Department of Homeland Security has never released a complete list of the names or criminal histories of the men it sent to CECOT. Rapid deportations have been a key part of the Trump administration’s immigration overhaul. The administration considers anyone who crosses the border illegally to be a criminal. Illegal crossings are now at a historic low, but some immigration attorneys say the administration has used flawed criteria to justify deportations. Following some translator-aided sound from their second tailor-made case of injustice and disturbing allegations of having his genitals twisted, Alfonsi huffed about Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s spring visit to CECOT with gang members behind her in prison cells. On this, Weiss called out there tiny snippet as incomplete: “We can report that she took pictures and video there with MS-13 gang members, not TdA members, with no comment from her or her staff about what her goal on that trip was, or what she saw there, or if she had or has concerns about the treatment of detainees like the ones in our piece.” The liberal media defenders out there think allowing such odious figures the chance to explain themselves isn’t journalism but open partisanship. Alfonsi further showed her cards in how this story was laundered through both this Soros group and students at UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center and their lefty adviser Alexa Koenig. She teamed up with the second group to play amateur Sherlock Holmes (click “expand”): This is the portion of the CECOT ‘60 Minutes’ piece that Bari Weiss seems to have had the most issues with, specifically two things.... 1. She wrote Alfonsi and her team she was using months-old soundbites of President Trump and @KarolineLeavitt when they should have sought… pic.twitter.com/TBYnrdAHiS — Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) December 23, 2025   ALFONSI [TO PAPPIER]: There were men standing behind her, heavily tattooed. Who are those men? Do we know? PAPPIER: We know that those men in her video are not Venezuelans. They are Salvadorans probably accused of being gang leaders, and probably people who have been in jail for many, many years in El Salvador. ALFONSI: Human Rights Watch was able to confirm that with the help of this intrepid team of students at UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center. UC BERKELEY STUDENT #1: All the visible men have either an MS on their chest or a 13 or an ES for El Salvador, and all those gangs are associated with El Salvador. ALFONSI [TO UC BERKELEY STUDENT #1]: Not the Venezuelans? UC BERKELEY STUDENT #1: Yeah ALFONSI: To help verify the deportees’ stories for Human Rights Watch, the team of students combed through open source data for weeks. Students are trained in advanced techniques and follow strict international standards for obtaining digital evidence that can be used in courts. Analyzing satellite imagery, they mapped the prison, and identified the building where the Venezuelans were held. And remember all those influencers who filmed inside CECOT? One toured an isolation cell. These are the rooms of solitary confinement that matched the description of the so-called island where the deportees described being tortured. SOCIAL MEDIA INFLUENCER: And they get absolutely nothing to use to sleep or to rest. Just pure concrete. ALFONSI: A show and tell the armory confirmed CECOT had the weapons the Venezuelans say guards used on them. UC BERKELEY STUDENT #2: What we did see in these videos was the use of the Ti batons on prisoners. Additionally, we also saw the use of painful body positions. ALFONSI [TO UC BERKELEY STUDENT #2]: They were showing that off in the videos? UC BERKELEY STUDENT #2: And they do that. It’s sort of a practice. ALFONSI: But it was this interview with the prison warden that proved to be most helpful. CECOT PRISON WARDEN [VOICE OF TRANSLATOR]: The light system is 24 hours a day. UC BERKELEY STUDENT #2: One of the questions that we had was, are the lights on 24/7? He said, yes, they are. So, he’s talking about how hot it can get in the prison. So, there’s this sort of Pride around the poor conditions and around the suffering. ALFONSI: Using extreme temperatures or light to disorient inmates is also prohibited under UN standards. HUMAN RIGHTS CENTER CO-FACULTY DIRECTOR ALEXA KOENIG: I think one of the things that the work of this team has really shown is that a lot of these stories can be believed. ALFONSI: Alexa Koenig is the director of Berkeley’s Investigations Lab, which trains students to research war crimes and human rights violations, KOENIG: And it’s those little details that I think then if you can bring that together with the physical evidence, I think you have the strongest possible case for accountability, whether it’s in court of public opinion or at some point in a court of law. Weiss tore into this field trip in her email: “I also think that the ensuing analysis form the Berkeley students is strange. The pictures are alarming; we should include them. But what does the analysis add?” Having wasted over 13 minutes of our time on a grim prison at least some Americans are unlikely to shed any tears over, Alfonsi offered the lie about DHS ignoring her and ended by revealing 252 Venezuelan men who spent time at CECOT were released and “sent back to Caracas in exchange for 10 Americans that had been imprisoned in Venezuela” while other illegal immigrants could be deported “to other so-called third countries” with “well-documented histories of torturing prisoners.” To see the relevant transcript from Global TV on December 22, click here.