Ex-ABC News reporter Terry Moran ripped “60 Minutes” on Monday over its interview with Donald Trump, which arrived just months after CBS’s parent company struck a widely-panned $16 million settlement deal with the president.
Moran, when asked by CNN’s Brianna Keilar about the timing of the interview, pointed to Trump “dunking” on “60 Minutes” as he gloated about Paramount paying him “a lot of money” in an unaired exchange with correspondent Norah O’Donnell.
“It was an interview without a lot of pushback. It was an interview that let him carry on,” said Moran, who did not refer to O’Donnell by name.
Moran said it’s “impossible to say” whether conservative journalist Bari Weiss, who Paramount named as CBS News’ editor-in-chief in October, was part of the equation, noting that she’s “been very kind” to the president.
Moran, who sat down with the president in late April, less than two months before his “world class haters” post on Trump and senior White House aide Stephen Miller led to his ABC News ouster, was later asked by CNN’s Boris Sanchez what he “would’ve pushed back on” during the interview.
He emphasized that Trump is a “very tough interview because he’s just spewing a lot of stuff that isn’t true.”
“You don’t have to get in a fight with him. You don’t ― you shouldn’t, right? You should treat him with the respect that the office deserves and that the people elected him deserve. But at the same time, you have to stand up to something because if you condone his falsehoods, that empowers him,” he said.
“Every authoritarian in the book does this, and you can look it up, and that’s what he’s doing. So, I do think at some point, you have to stand up for what is true, even at the risk of displeasing Trump or your bosses.”
Following Moran’s exit from ABC News, he has since launched a SubStack newsletter and gone on to defend his “accurate, fair and true description” of Miller, emphasizing that “cruelty is the point” with him.
Watch Moran’s appearance on “CNN News Central” below.