(Ken Silva, Headline USA) Earlier this month, it was announced that CBS News fired senior correspondent Catherine Herridge. Now, CBS faces backlash for reportedly seizing Herridge’s computers and records on her way out the door.
CBS’s seizures come as Herridge holds strong against potential contempt-of-court charges for refusing to divulge the identity of a source who fed her information on Chinese national Yanping Chen, a Defense Department contractor who has ties to the Chinese Communist Party. Herridge’s source may have been within the FBI, as her reporting was underpinned by information that the bureau generated during its investigation into Chen.
That raises the question: Was CBS’s seizure of Herridge’s files related to the hunt for the source that leaked her FBI records?
It’s certainly plausible, as CBS has likely been infiltrated by the FBI.
Indeed, in 2011 an FBI memo surfaced, revealing that an ABC News journalist had been doubling as an FBI informant in the mid-90s. That journalist/informant, Christopher Isham, had moved on to serve as the vice president and Washington bureau chief for CBS by the time the FBI memo was made public in 2011.
Rather than investigate the matter, CBS said at the time that the news of Isham being an informant was “a matter between the FBI and ABC News.” Isham left CBS in 2020, but considering its apathy towards employing an alleged informant, it seems likely that CBS has maintained its cozy relationship with the FBI since then.
CBS’s treatment of Herridge wouldn’t be the first time that news agency seized a journalist’s records.
According to former CBS journalist Sharyl Attkisson, her former employer still has data from a computer she used when she was investigating the Obama-era Operation Fast and Furious scandal.
Attkisson had her electronic devices hacked by government agents in retaliation for her reporting, and she’s currently suing over the matter. As part of her lawsuit, she had to legally compel CBS to give her a computer hard drive that was hacked while she worked there.
CBS even filed a motion to quash Attkisson’s quest for these records last month, arguing that the news agency has already done plenty to aid the journalist in her lawsuit against the government.
Moreover, Attkisson claims that CBS is still withholding some data from that harddrive. In a court filing last May, she said she received the hard drive from CBS—but some of the data was missing.
“What is for certain at present is that the CBS drive produced per the Court order contains only about 80-90% of the information contained on the Original hard drive and has significant differences that are not explainable without further clarification from CBS or its vendor,” Attkisson said in her filing.
“It is odd or unusual that a forensic consultant retained by CBS would hand-deliver evidence to a third-party and there be no record of what evidence was removed, copied, or provided, nor evidence of who received the evidence,” she said.
The former CBS journalist still seeks answers as to why she didn’t get the original hard drive that she needs.
CBS has not responded to questions about why it seized Herridge’s records, according to The Hill.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
