NEW YORK (AP) — CBS Information stated the Trump marketing campaign provided “shifting explanations” for why it backed out of a “60 Minutes” interview particular with presidential candidates that aired with out him.
The community’s Scott Pelley appeared on the air Monday evening to clarify why Republican Donald Trump didn’t seem on what has change into a “60 Minutes” custom: back-to-back interviews with presidential candidates within the final month of the marketing campaign.
Harris was on the present, interviewed by Invoice Whitaker. The place Trump was supposed to look, “60 Minutes” as an alternative aired a narrative about an Arizona official pushing false claims about election fraud.
Pelley stated that the Trump marketing campaign “complained that we would fact-check the interview. We fact-check every story.”
The Trump crew additionally demanded an apology for his interview in the course of the 2020 marketing campaign, the place he claimed that correspondent Lesley Stahl stated a laptop computer pc belonging to President Joe Biden’s son Hunter got here from Russia. “She never said that,” Pelley stated.
Pelley stated that Trump’s crew had agreed to an interview on the former president’s Mar-a-Lago residence, with a further discuss in Butler, Pennsylvania, the place he returned to the scene of a July assassination try.
Trump spokesman Steven Cheung stated “60 Minutes” “begged for an interview.” The marketing campaign did have considerations concerning the present’s reporting on Hunter Biden and the way it insisted upon enhancing Trump’s feedback, he stated.
“There was nothing scheduled or agreed upon,” Cheung stated. ”We had already lengthy promised an unique in filming at Butler to a different nationwide outlet, which turned out the be Fox Information.”
Trump’s interview with Fox’s Laura Ingraham aired an hour earlier than “60 Minutes” on Monday evening. His absence from CBS was not talked about of their alternate. Trump apparently, watched, nonetheless, posting on Reality Social that the Harris interview “is considered by many of those who reviewed it, the WORST interview they have ever seen.”
Pelley poked at Trump, noting he had already turned down one other alternative to debate Harris, together with the “60 Minutes” interview, “which may have been the largest audience for the candidates between now and election day.”
Shifting “60 Minutes” out of its conventional Sunday time slot might have depressed the viewers dimension, nonetheless. An estimated 5.4 million folks watched on Monday, in response to preliminary Nielsen firm figures, in contrast with the 9.6 million who noticed the newsmagazine on Sunday, Sept. 29.
No estimate for Trump’s viewers on Ingraham’s present was instantly accessible. Her present averaged 2.7 million viewers an evening final week, Nielsen stated.
