Trump Mulls Suing CBS News for Uncut Tapes of Harris’s 60 Minutes Interview

Former President Donald Trump holds a town hall at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pa., on Oct. 14, 2024. Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Former President Donald Trump said on Oct. 18 that he will consider taking legal action against CBS News for allegedly editing Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris’s answers in an interview on “60 Minutes.”

Trump made the remarks during an interview with podcaster Dan Bongino on Oct. 18, in which he called on the television network to release the unedited video of the interview that aired on Oct. 7. He alleged that the network had “changed” Harris’s answer.

“We want them to release the tapes now. So I think I’m going to sue them actually. I think so,” he stated. “They can’t defend it, and if they do, and even if they win, it’s going to be very embarrassing.”

“They took the answer out and put a new answer in,” Trump said, adding that the network should have its license revoked.

On Oct. 6, the news outlet posted a teaser clip of the interview showing “60 Minutes” host Bill Whitaker asking Harris whether the U.S. government has any influence over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The Democratic presidential nominee responded with a lengthy answer explaining the United States’ ongoing diplomatic efforts to engage with Israeli leadership.

“The work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by, or a result of, many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region,” she said in the teaser.

But in the full interview aired on Oct. 7, the vice president’s response appeared differently: “We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end.”

CBS has also published a full transcript of the interview. The network has not yet issued any statement explaining the contrast in Harris’s answers to the question.

Trump posted on Truth Social on Oct. 18 demanding that the television network release the unedited tapes of the interview “for the good of America,” while asking why the network won’t release them.

“Could it be because it was a COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER, or that they ‘CREATED’ many additional new answers for her, not just the one where she was so embarrassingly CAUGHT,” he wrote.

The Epoch Times reached out to CBS for comment but had not heard back as of publication time.

Earlier this month, CBS announced that the Republican presidential candidate had declined to participate in a “60 Minutes” interview despite initially agreeing to the request.

Trump campaign communications director Steven Cheung later said that they had not agreed for the former president to be interviewed. Cheung said there were initial discussions about the interview “but nothing was ever scheduled or locked in.”

Katabella Roberts contributed to this report.