The controversial “60 Minutes” interview at the center of President Donald Trump’s high-stakes lawsuit against CBS News is now an Emmy-nominated program.
The nominations for the 46th News & Documentary Emmy Awards were announced Thursday. “60 Minutes” landed several nods, most notably in the Outstanding Edited Interview category for its primetime special featuring then-Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
Among the other nominees in that category include CBS’ interviews with Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and the late Pope Francis, as well as NBC’s interview with Celine Dion and ABC’s interview with Brittney Griner.
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“Of course it’s nominated for best editing because it takes some serious talent to edit Kamala’s answer into something that’s coherent and understandable, which in the end they still failed to do,” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung told Fox News Digital.
Neither CBS News nor representatives for Trump’s legal team responded to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.
Last fall, Trump filed a $10 billion lawsuit (it has since been increased to $20 billion) against CBS News and its parent company Paramount Global for what he alleged was election interference with how the network handled its Harris interview in the days leading up to the presidential election.
The lawsuit stems from an exchange Harris had with “60 Minutes” correspondent Bill Whitaker, who asked her why Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasn’t “listening” to the Biden administration.
Harris was widely mocked for the “word salad” answer that aired in a preview clip of the interview on “Face the Nation.” However, when Whitaker asked the same question during the primetime special, Harris had a different, more concise response. Critics at the time accused CBS News of editing Harris’ “word salad” answer to shield the then-vice president from further backlash leading up to Election Day.
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Earlier this year, Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chair Brendan Carr ordered CBS News to hand over the unedited transcript of the interview as part of its investigation into whether the network violated the FCC’s “news distortion” policy after a complaint was filed. CBS had refused to release the unedited transcript when the controversy first began.
The released raw transcript and footage showed that both sets of Harris’ comments came from the same response, but CBS News had aired only the first half of her response in the “Face the Nation” preview clip and aired the second half during the primetime special.
In the months since, CBS News has faced turmoil. Shari Redstone, Paramount’s controlling shareholder, is reportedly in favor of settling the lawsuit with the president. Many believe a settlement would help pave the way for Paramount’s planned merger with Skydance Media in hopes of preventing potential retribution by Trump’s FCC, which has the authority to halt the multibillion-dollar transaction.
Both parties agreed to mediation which is currently underway, signaling their courtroom feud will result in a settlement.
“60 Minutes” executive producer Bill Owens, who at the time refused to apologize for the Harris interview, resigned last week citing corporate pressure he said prevented him from maintaining editorial independence. Redstone not only wanted to reportedly “keep tabs” on upcoming segments involving Trump, she reportedly urged CBS execs to delay any sensitive reporting on Trump until after the merger deal closed with Skydance.
The speculation was affirmed by journalists on “CBS Evening News” and “60 Minutes” who saluted the beloved network producer on-air while addressing Trump’s looming lawsuit.
One CBS News insider told Fox News Digital that everyone at the network is “on edge” over the ongoing drama.
“Nobody knows the next shoe that will drop,” they told Fox News Digital. “And internally, it’s just very chaotic because everyone doesn’t know what will happen next.”
CBS staffers believe Trump’s lawsuit is “BS” and that no one wants to see Paramount settle. Some are even “scared” about the prospect of a settlement, believing it will “hurt the news division and the perception of it.”
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