Dan Rather said his dismissal from CBS News nearly two decades ago was “certainly … the lowest point of his famous journalism career” as he returned to his former employer’s airwaves for the first time Sunday.
“I gave everything I had to CBS News,” the 92-year-old newsman said. “They had smarter, better, more talented people, but they didn’t have anyone who worked harder than me.”
Rather’s comments came during a reflective interview on CBS Sunday Morning ahead of the release of a Netflix documentary about his life and work.
He spent 44 years at CBS – including 24 years as anchor of its evening news program – but he lost his position there in 2004 after a botched investigation into the military record of George W. Bush, his second term as president. Successfully ran for tenure. ,
Rather, he avoided official blame for a report that questioned Bush’s service in the National Guard during the Vietnam War. But he introduced the piece in his role as anchor and remained inextricably linked with it.
CBS later said it could not confirm the authenticity of some of the records on which the investigation relied, although several people who worked on the story said this was true.
Nonetheless, Rather signed on to the CBS airwaves as anchor for the last time on March 9, 2005. And he ultimately left the network after his contract expired a little more than a year later.
According to the Associated Press, in the Netflix documentary that debuted Wednesday, Rather believed he would survive the failed investigation of Bush’s military service and was surprised by his debacle at CBS.
But in the film he says he realized the reality when his wife Jean told him, “You got into a fight with the President of the United States during his re-election campaign. What did you think was going to happen? ?”
Rather’s career in journalism continued after leaving CBS, publishing investigations and conducting interviews for the digital cable and satellite television network HDNet. He has written books, commented on presidential politics, and catered to a younger audience on social media.
But he did not return to CBS for years because of a long-standing grudge between himself and the network’s former head Leslie Moonves, who sued after multiple women accused him of sexual harassment, assault or abuse in the 1980s. Later resigned in 2018.
As the AP reports, he finally returns to CBS just days before the debut of the Netflix biographical docuseries Rather, which chronicles his anchor years reporting on the John F. Kennedy assassination, Vietnam and Watergate, and its aftermath.
The AP notes that the documentary addresses some awkward chapters of Rather’s tenure as a journalist, including an attack on him by someone in New York City when he said, “What a frequency, Kenneth, ” before going on stage with REM as the band performed a song named after him. phrase.
“Without apology or explanation, I miss CBS,” Rather said in Sunday’s interview, which was filmed at his home in Texas. “I’ve been missing it since the day I left.”
Rather said he has not lost the instinct that made him realize decades ago that he wanted to be a reporter.
Rather said, “In the heart of every reporter worth his name… there is a message that the news, the real news, is what someone somewhere – especially someone in power – doesn’t want you to know.” This is news.”
He added: “I wake up every morning, and as soon as my feet hit the ground, I say, ‘Where’s the story?'”
Asked whether it made a difference how big or small the audience was, Rather replied, “No.”
