A veteran “60 Minutes” correspondent ripped the famed CBS programming as a “snake pit” plagued by “no civility.”
Steve Kroft, who spent 30 years as one of the mainstay journalists on “60 Minutes,” instructed podcaster Bill O’Reilly that if he were provided the likelihood to do it again, he would reply: “No, I probably wouldn’t do it again…I hated it.”
The 80-year-old former correspondent described the prestigious newsmagazine not as a dream job, but as a brutal grind and psychological battlefield that wore him down over time.
Steve Kroft speaks with Bill O’Reilly during a current interview, where he said he “hated” his time at “60 Minutes” and described a brutal newsroom tradition. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMXiQxIyvNA
Kroft said the job was a relentless, all-consuming slog — “24 hours a day” — with fixed journey, writing, enhancing and screenings that never appeared to stop.
“You may get a couple hours… then getting on jets… coming back and spending three or four days writing… then starting it all over again,” Kroft instructed O’Reilly’s “We’ll Do It Live” podcast on Thursday.
The tempo left little room to breathe — a nonstop cycle that he said in the end made the job depressing despite its status.
But it was the tradition inside the newsroom that drew Kroft’s most scathing criticism.
Before becoming a member of 60 Minutes, Kroft said he got a stark warning from Dan Rather about the show’s cutthroat tradition — recalling that Rather instructed him the newsroom was crammed with “big cats” who could take you down with a single swipe, leaving you “limping for six months.”
Kroft said the warning proved correct once he arrived.
“There was no civility at 60 Minutes,” Kroft instructed O’Reilly, describing a office where primary decency was absent and suspicion was fixed.
“If there was civility… you better check your wallet,” he added, suggesting even friendliness came with ulterior motives.
Kroft speaks with O’Reilly and displays on his a long time at “60 Minutes,” saying the job was “24 hours a day.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMXiQxIyvNA
The atmosphere, he said, shortly turned colleagues into adversaries.
“When I was tapped to go to 60 Minutes… not everybody was happy… you’ve all of a sudden made a bunch of enemies,” Kroft said.
“It’s just… a snake pit.”
That hostility fueled a fixed sense of paranoia inside the newsroom, where journalists were pushed by competitors for standing and airtime, the ex-correspondent said.
“Everybody knows the environment… they think that somebody is behind them… going to put a shiv in their back,” Kroft said.
Kroft also recalled touchdown one of the most consequential interviews of his profession — sitting down with Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton at the top of the 1992 marketing campaign, as allegations about Clinton’s relationship with Gennifer Flowers exploded into the national highlight.
The phase came collectively at the last minute after Clinton backed out of another TV look — with Kroft and his group scrambling to secure a coveted post-Super Bowl slot that assured a huge viewers.
Steve Kroft, pictured during his tenure at “60 Minutes,” said the job was a nonstop grind with “no civility” behind the scenes. 60 Minutes
The Clinton camp, however, misinterpret the state of affairs — anticipating a routine marketing campaign interview, not a deep dive into scandal.
Kroft opened with a deceptively easy query — “So tell me who is Gennifer Flowers and how do you know her?” — catching the candidate off guard as he denied the allegations while Hillary stood firmly by his aspect.
Hillary Clinton later blasted Kroft for lobbing what she called “mean questions,” triggering a public pushback from the show’s management and cementing the interview as a defining second in the race.
Kroft said the interview in the end formed his view of Bill Clinton. He agreed with O’Reilly’s characterization of Clinton as “not a truthful man” — including that during the scandal-plagued marketing campaign, “if he was going to stay in this, he had to lie.”
Kroft left the show in 2019.
Steve Kroft interviews Bill and Hillary Clinton in 1992 for “60 Minutes,” as allegations about Gennifer Flowers dominated the marketing campaign. CBS /Landov
Bari Weiss, the newly put in editor-in-chief of CBS News, is planning a main overhaul of the show after the conclusion of this season, The Post reported earlier this week.
The shakeup follows the Paramount-Skydance merger and displays a broader push by new management to refocus the program’s editorial direction.
The modifications have rattled the newsroom, with inner clashes over editorial selections, deliberate layoffs and uncertainty surrounding high expertise —- as Weiss and executives eye a youthful, retooled roster more aligned with the new imaginative and prescient.
The Post has sought remark from CBS News and the Clintons.
