How Bari Weiss of The Free Press Won the Top Job at CBS News

“I’m a newspaper woman without a newspaper,” Bari Weiss said four years ago on the first episode of her podcast, “Honestly.”

Today Ms. Weiss still does not have a newspaper. But she was just handed the sterling silver keys to the Tiffany network.

On Monday, Ms. Weiss was named the new editor in chief of CBS News. The network’s owner, Paramount, also announced the acquisition of her start-up, The Free Press, for a price said to be about $150 million in cash and stock.

In its nearly 100 years, CBS has not seen a leader quite like Ms. Weiss. Neither has the media industry. Ms. Weiss, 41, has ascended the mountain of journalism on a slingshot. In 2020, she publicly resigned as an opinion writer and editor at The New York Times to start a newsletter on Substack. Today, she has one of the most prestigious jobs in news.