In a shocking memo on Friday, CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss and CBS News president/executive editor Tom Cibrowski announced a number of layoffs and that includes the entire CBS Radio News division. That service will end on May 22, 2026 after nearly 100 years.
The memo, which was posted to social media mid-morning Friday, announced that the network informed the CBS News Radio team and approximately 700 affiliated stations that they are ending the service, blaming a shift in radio station programming strategies and challenging economic times.
"Unfortunately, this decision means that all positions within the CBS News Radio team are being eliminated," says the memo. "We understand how difficult this news is for our staff and their colleagues, who have worked side by side with us to cover some of the most significant stories of our time. While this was a necessary decision, it was not an easy one. A shift in radio station programming strategies, coupled with challenging economic realities, has made it impossible to continue the service. We are sharing this announcement now to fulfill our commitments to our radio partners and affiliates, which require advance notice of the service’s conclusion."
CBS Radio was created around the birth of radio in America, initially coming on the air in 1927. Stations like WCCO had been early affiliates, which still are as of today, nearly 100 years later.
"CBS News Radio has delivered original reporting to the nation—from Edward R. Murrow’s World War II reports in London to today’s daily White House updates," continues the memo from CBS. " Our signature broadcast, 'World News Roundup,' remains the longest-running newscast in the country."
Many of the largest radio stations in America, from WCCO in Minnesota, to WBBM in Chicago, KCBS in San Francisco, and 1010 WINS in New York, were CBS affiliates going back to 1929.
CBS voices for decades have brought some of the biggest news stories to listeners all across the country, from Pearl Harbor to the JFK assassination, from 9/11 to the current war in Iran. Those voices now will go silent in May.The front page of CBS News' website did not immediately carry news of the demise.
Weiss is not a stranger to CBS' storied history. Addressing her staff in January, three months into her job as CBS News boss, she invoked the network's legendary newsman Walter Cronkite as a symbol of old thinking and said that if the network continues with its current strategy, “we’re toast.”
Weiss announced the hiring of 18 new contributors and said CBS News needs to do stories that will “surprise and provoke — including inside our own newsroom.”
Weiss, founder of the Free Press website and without broadcast news experience before being hired by CBS parent Paramount’s new management, has quickly become a headline-maker and polarizing figure in journalism. She held a “60 Minutes” story critical of President Donald Trump’s deportation policy from being broadcast for a month and has critics watching to see if she’s moving the network in a Trump-friendly direction.
Those stations include some of the nation's most legendary brands like WCCO, KCBS, WBBM and hundreds more
