Gayle King rubbed some fellow CBS News staffers the wrong way during an all-hands meeting this week, according to a new report. The CBS Mornings anchor showed support to the network’s new editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss, during the meeting, per The Independent.
“If you don’t want to be here, if this is not the place, it’s OK,” King reportedly said at the end of the meeting, echoing Weiss’ sentiment that anyone who doesn’t think she’s the “right leader” for the network could feel free to leave. “But for the rest of us who would like to be here, who’d like to do a good job and figure things out along the way, this is a very bumpy time for all of us.”
She then reportedly defended Weiss against “leakers in the building,” telling her new boss, “I thought you made it very clear if you’re not the leader for them. I would like to think that we can have conversations, and that we could talk candidly with each other, and it’s not going to friggin be in the paper. I am so sick of that!”
In a subsequent article published by The Independent, multiple anonymous staffers spoke out against King for her remarks. “Gayle instead made it about her not liking the fact that people are talking to the press about her future at CBS News,” one employee said. “Forget the substance of people’s grievances and fears.”
However, another staffer also told the outlet that King received an applause from her colleagues. “It was nothing but positive feelings at the end of the the town hall yesterday,” the employee claimed.
Weiss has already begun implementing changes at the network, most notably with bringing Tony Dokoupil over as the new anchor of CBS Evening News. According to The Independent, more changes are coming to the evening news program, with staffers receiving an email that offered them an “extraordinary chance to leave CBS News with an enhanced separation payment.”
Amid the changes at CBS News, questions about King’s future with the network have risen. King’s contract reportedly ends in May and there have been conflicting reports about whether she will remain with the morning show.
“I’m not going to negotiate in the press,” King insisted on a recent episode of Sherri. “I hear one thing in the building and one thing outside the building. I’ll be reading an article, and I’m like, ‘That’s not true, that’s not true.’ I’ve decided I’m going to stay out of the drama… and there is some drama. I’m going to stay out of that and just continue to do my job.”
CBS Mornings, Weekdays, 7a/7c, CBS
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