Former President Donald Trump recently demanded an apology from CBS News after he declined to give an interview to CBS’ “60 Minutes.” Trump maintained that the network still owes him an apology from an interview in 2020 that the Republican presidential candidate claims was unfair and biased toward him, amid the perpetual hostility directed at him from the mainstream media.
Reportedly, CBS had reached out to former President Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris to conduct respective interviews with each candidate as the election draws nearer. Harris agreed to sit down for an interview with CBS News correspondent Bill Whitaker. However, Trump declined the offer to do an interview with Scott Pelley.
The X account for “60 Minutes” took to social media, posting, “A Programming Note: 60 Minutes is scheduled to air a primetime election special on a Monday edition of the broadcast on October 7 at 8 PM. For over half a century, 60 Minutes has invited the Democratic and Republican tickets to appear on our broadcast as Americans head to the polls. This year, both the Harris and Trump campaigns agreed to sit down with 60 Minutes. Vice President Harris will speak with correspondent Bill Whitaker.”
Continuing, the post read, “After initially accepting 60 Minutes’ request for an interview with Scott Pelley, former President Trump’s campaign has decided not to participate. Pelley will address this Monday evening. Our election special will broadcast the Harris interview on Monday as planned. Our original invitation to former President Donald Trump to be interviewed on 60 Minutes stands.”
Responding to the statement, Trump campaign Communications Director Steven Cheung said, “Fake News. 60 Minutes begged for an interview, even after they were caught lying about Hunter Biden’s laptop back in 2020. There were initial discussions, but nothing was ever scheduled or locked in. They also insisted on doing live fact checking, which is unprecedented.”
Another user in the comments section shared a screenshot of a post from Trump which read, “FAKE NEWS 60 Minutes begged me for an interview — begged! I turned them down because they wanted to do live fact-checking. Totally rigged! No one’s ever seen anything like this before. You can’t fact-check the greatest president ever! I DON’T DO FACT-CHECKING! SAD!”
Former President Trump also addressed CBS’ invitation for an interview during a recent press conference in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, indicating that he would “love to do 60 Minutes,” but he is still waiting on an apology from the program relating to fact-checks from Leslie Stahl during the 2020 interview, which the host disputed the Hunter Biden laptop story.
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“Well, right now, they came to me and would like me to do an interview, but first I want to get an apology, because the last time I did an interview with them, if you remember, they challenged me on the computer. They said the ‘laptop from hell’ was from Russia, and I said it wasn’t from Russia,” Trump said, “If you remember Lesley Stahl, we got into a little bit of an argument on the camera, talking about that and other things. And you know, they really owed me an apology.”
Watch JD Vance fire back at Margaret Brennan’s “fact-check” during the vice presidential debate below: