A “60 Minutes” correspondent defended CBS News’ controversial decision to air an edited version of Vice President Kamala Harris’ interview last week — but declined to comment on whether the full transcript should be released.
“Things are edited in every story,” Jon Wertheim said Wednesday on sports podcast “Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich” on OutKick.com.
Aside from working as a “60 Minutes” correspondent, Wertheim is a senior writer for Sports Illustrated and a commentator for The Tennis Channel.
“You do these interviews, and ‘60 Minutes’ segments [are] about 13 minutes and 10 seconds, right?” Wertheim said. “You spend hours, sometimes days and days, with the subject and, you know, you boil it down to 13 minutes.”
Wertheim declined to answer whether the full transcript of the interview by “60 Minutes” correspondent Bill Whitaker should be released, claiming it’s “above [his] pay grade.”
He argued that there are some statements in transcripts that won’t make sense – and that news networks often edit out unflattering answers.
“That happens all the time when you do a ‘60 Minutes’ interview. Somebody says, ‘You know what, can you ask me that again? I don’t like the way that came out,’” Wertheim said. “You don’t put their first answer on there as an empathetic human being.”
CBS has faced a flood of backlash for airing an edited version of Harris’ answer to US relations with Israel on Oct. 7 after broadcasting her “word salad” reply to the same question during a promo for the upcoming special on CBS’ “Face the Nation” the day before.
The editing decision provoked questions about whether CBS executives had moved to conceal Harris’ more convoluted answers.
Wertheim argued that major news networks – along with newspapers – regularly make editing choices to save on time or space, or to pick the most impactful quotes.
“When would you do a story and not edit, and not make choices and not make sort of selective quotes?” Wertheim said. “When, in media, do you not make editorial choices?”
Dakich, the podcast host, said media outlets constantly air snippets from interviews that make guests look bad. Dakich said he regretted one of his own answers after a past interview, but the media outlet refused to ax it.
“I think what people are thinking is that ‘60 Minutes’ and mainstream media are trying to make Kamala Harris look good, as opposed to portraying who Kamala Harris actually was in that interview,” Dakich said.
But Wertheim argued that “60 Minutes” did not alter any of Harris’ answers.
“There wasn’t anything doctored,” Wertheim said. “You just make editorial decisions to fit into a time.”
Harris’ campaign has fought to distance itself from the network’s editing controversy.
“We do not control CBS’s production decisions and refer questions to CBS,” a Harris campaign aide told multiple outlets including Fox News and Variety.
Former President Donald Trump and his campaign have called on CBS to release the full transcript of the interview.
“Why did 60 Minutes choose not to air Kamala’s full word salad, and what else did they choose not to air?” Trump 2024 national press secretary Karoline Leavitt previously told The Post in a statement. “The American people deserve the full, unedited transcript from Kamala’s sit-down interview.”