Matt Gutman, an ABC News veteran, will join CBS News in what is expected to be a prominent on air role, making him the first on-screen talent to join the Paramount Skydance news division in its time underrecently appointed editor in chief Bari Weiss.
He is expected to start at CBS News on January 5 and will remain based in Los Angeles. Gutman will serve as a lead correspondent for "48 Hours" and serve as a fill in anchor on flagship CBS News programs. The news division also said he would contribute to future season of "60 Minutes."
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"Matt Gutman goes there. He brings the audience along with him to whatever story he is covering, and he approaches his work with the qualities we look for in all our journalists: fearlessness, energy and relentlessness," said Weiss, in a statement. "I cannot wait for him to get started."
Gutman has been embroiled in a few controversies during his time at ABC News. In September, he generated pushback after calling texts from Tyler Robinson, the assassin who killed conservative advocate Charlie Kirk "very touching in a way we did not expect." Gutman later apologized for his choice of words. In 2020, ABC News suspended him for reporting erroneously on air that all four of basketball great Kobe Bryant's children were on board a helicopter that killed the athlete after it crashed in California. Only Bryant and one daughter were flying in the craft.
CBS News on Tuesday spotlighted Gutman's experience covering events in the Middle East, an area of coverage that is said to be a favorite of Weiss, an opinion journalist who has advocated for Israel in The Free Press, a conservative site that Paramount bought earlier this year for a reported $150 million. Gutman has also been on the ground in Ukraine during its current war with Russia and was in Thailand to cover the story of agroup of young soccer players who had gotten trapped in a cave.
"I have worked with Matt for decades and I have seen his innate ability to take viewers into a story," said Tom Cibrowski, president of CBS News, in a statement. "Whether he's on the frontlines of a conflict or the scene of a rescue mission, he has the power to connect with people in a way that informs and engages. He has a sharp news sense, an acute ability to deliver immersive storytelling and a deep appreciation of history that will be an asset to all of us."
Gutman joined ABC News in 2008 as a radio correspondent. He began his journalism career as a freelance print reporter in the Middle East covering the war on terror. He is a graduate of Williams College in Massachusetts.
"I am thrilled to be joining CBS, a network with TV news' most storied past, and most exciting future. With Bari and Tom at the helm, our mission is to tell the most important news stories and bring our audience along with us to places they wouldn't otherwise be able to go, to give a voice to those who might otherwise not be heard, and to tell it straight," said Gutman, in a statement.
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