Transcript of Israel Ramps Up Attacks Amid Iran Talks, E. Jean Carroll Investigation, CBS Overhaul

Israel is expanding its invasion of Lebanon.

And that creates an obstacle to ending the broader Mideast war. President Trump wants to get out of the war with Iran, and Iran says any deal must include Lebanon, too. So what's the way forward?

I'm Steve Inskeep, with Amy Martinez, and this is Up First from NPR News. The Justice Department uses taxpayer funds for another step in President Trump's retribution campaign. E. Jean Carroll won a sexual abuse claim against Donald Trump, and now prosecutors under Trump's direction are investigating a nonprofit that paid her legal expenses.

And CBS News is overhauling 60 Minutes. Network's new editor-in-chief Barry Weiss forced out veteran correspondents and brought in an executive producer who has never worked in broadcast news. So what's behind the restructuring? Stay with us, we've got the news you need to start your day. Israel's war in Lebanon has complicated the Trump administration's effort to get out of the war with Iran.

Here's how those two conflicts are connected: when the United States and Israel attacked Iran early this year, Iran's ally Hezbollah in Lebanon struck back against Israel. Israeli forces then invaded Lebanon. Now President Trump wants out of the war, and Iranians are insisting that any peace deal should include Lebanon. Israeli forces have intensified attacks there and moved further into the country.

Here to tell us more about this is NPR's Jane Arraf in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon. Jane, so we've been hearing a lot about whether the U.S. is close to an agreement with Iran or not. Where do things stand?

Well, here's the latest from Vice President J.D. Vance last night in Washington. He said, quote, "We're not there, but we're very close." He did say, though, that it's hard to say if or when President Trump would sign a deal. So there's that uncertainty. U.S. U.S. and Iranian officials over the past week have said that a potential deal would reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and it would leave nuclear talks for later. One of the sticking points there is still what Iran does with its stockpiles of highly enriched uranium. The U.S. wants it to send those out of the country.

So, as Steve mentioned earlier, Iran has insisted it won't sign a deal with the U.S. without an end to the war in Lebanon, where Israel is fighting the militant group Hezbollah. Any sign of that happening?

Well, Israel has actually intensified its attacks here, and it could indeed put an agreement between Iran and the US at risk. It has expanded its invasion in the south, and yesterday launched another attack in a Beirut suburb where Hezbollah has offices, the first attack in Beirut in almost 3 weeks. The Israeli prime minister has said he will crush Hezbollah, the militant group, but civilians are paying a very high price here. And that's while Israel, despite a ceasefire there, has also expanded areas of Gaza that it has occupied, and it intends to take more, according to Israel's prime minister, which is pushing civilians into smaller and smaller areas.

Today in Washington, Lebanese and Israeli military officials are meeting again. How much leverage, Jane, does the Lebanese government have over Hezbollah?

Well, not a whole lot. Hezbollah was formed to counter an Israeli invasion in the '80s and has since become a part of the Lebanese state, essentially. Not just security, it has parliament members, runs social services, so it still wields quite a lot of power. We sat down recently with Hezbollah's spokesman here, and he said they will not disarm while Lebanon is under attack.

Now, it's supposed to be a ceasefire in Lebanon. Clearly it is not. How is the country coping with that?

Well, there are entire border villages erased in the south, and fighting now centers around the district of Tire. That city has been inhabited for 5,000 years. It has important Roman sites, a nearby Crusader castle, Lebanese Culture Minister Ghassan Salameh tells NPR the Israeli strikes have put those at risk: "I can tell you that entire—

there has been bombing around 100 meters from the ruins.

The Bofour Castle has been hit directly, but archeologists cannot reach there." He says he hopes there will be a ceasefire soon to allow them to assess the damage. And meanwhile, of course, there's the human cost— tens of thousands of people being displaced again from there.

That is NPR's Jane Arraf in Beirut. Jane, thank you.

Thank you.

The Justice Department has opened another investigation that involves perceived political adversaries of President Trump.

This new probe centers around the writer E. Jean Carroll, who won two lawsuits against the president for sexual abuse and defamation.

NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas is here. So what can you tell us about the investigation, Ryan?

Well, the investigation is being handled by the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Northern District of Illinois, and it stems from a lawsuit that E. Jean Carroll filed and won against Trump. A source familiar with the matter tells me the focus of the investigation right now is a nonprofit, American Future Republic, and funding that it provided to pay for some of Carroll's legal expenses. Now, the nonprofit is backed by Reid Hoffman. Hoffman is a billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn. He's a major donor to Democratic causes. I'm told that investigators are looking into potential money laundering and obstruction, but there's some conflicting information on whether Carroll herself is currently under investigation. The U.S. Attorney's Office in Chicago put out a statement last night saying media reports that it had opened an investigation into Carroll were false. But one source tells me prosecutors are examining whether Carroll committed perjury, while another says Carroll is not currently under investigation but certainly could be as the probe moves forward. Uh, neither Carroll nor her attorney provided comment, and Hoffman couldn't be reached for comment.

And, and all this has to do with the deposition that Carroll gave in one of her lawsuits against Trump.

That's right, a deposition in 2022. Now, Trump accused Carroll of lying in that deposition about who was paying some of her legal fees. Carroll said no outside folks were chipping in to help out with the bills. It later came out that Hoffman's nonprofit was helping out. An appeals court later looked at that very issue after Trump challenged the verdict in the lawsuit, and the court found that there was no evidence to suggest that Carroll personally secured the outside funding, and it said that Carroll had plausibly forgotten about the funding and evidence showed she, quote, was simply not involved in the matter of who was or was not funding her litigation costs. That's what a 3-judge appeals court panel found. Trump, for his part, has consistently denied Carroll's claims and called the trials a witch hunt.

So, Ryan, how does this investigation fit the pattern you've seen in President Trump's second term?

Well, look, President Trump repeatedly said on the campaign trail that if he won, he would seek vengeance on his perceived political enemies, and the Justice Department in his second term has repeatedly gone run after Trump's critics and political adversaries. Former FBI Director James Comey has been indicted twice by this Justice Department, most recently for allegedly threatening Trump by posting a photo of seashells on social media. New York State Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, was indicted on financial charges last fall. The Southern Poverty Law Center, a longtime target of conservatives, was recently charged with misleading donors for paying informants to infiltrate hate groups. And now we have this investigation involving a major Democratic donor who Trump has called out publicly. And then E. Jean Carroll, who has been a very outspoken critic of Trump and who won huge financial settlements against him in court, uh, totaling nearly $90 million.

Yeah, how successful has the DOJ been with these cases?

Well, the Justice Department has flamed out repeatedly with these cases against Trump's critics. The first prosecutions against Comey and James were tossed out by a court, uh, after a judge found that the prosecutor who had secured the indictments was unlawfully appointed. We have seen grand juries reject the Justice Department's attempt to indict Democratic lawmakers over a video they put out urging military members to refuse illegal orders. But even though the department has struggled, these investigations, these prosecutions do impose real costs, real pain on those who are targeted, even when the cases fizzle.

That's NPR's Ryan Lucas. Ryan, thanks for laying this out for us.

Thank you.

CBS editor-in-chief Barry Weiss is asserting full control over the network's news division.

The new owners of CBS brought Weiss in last fall from her center-right opinion and news site, the Free Press. The goal was to move coverage away from what they believe is a woke and anti-President Trump tilt. And now Weiss is trying to reinvent the network's most prestigious and highest-rated program, 60 Minutes.

NPR's David Folkenflik is with us now with more. So, uh, David, how is Barry Weiss overhauling 60 Minutes?

Well, yesterday among those forced out were the show's executive producer, Tonya Simon— she's a veteran of several decades— and, and two correspondents, each of whom confirmed that publicly. In a sense, this This is what she was brought to CBS to do, what her bosses hope for and her critics fear. David Ellison and his father, Larry Ellison— Larry Ellison's the founder of Oracle— are Trump allies. This is, in a sense, what they would have wanted. The criticism? Well, we can let the correspondents who were fired speak for themselves. Sharon Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega were laid off in April at an awards ceremony. Alfonsi warned of the toxic spread of corporate meddling and editorial fear. She was talking about news coverage and judgment there. Last night, in a statement she shared with NPR, Cecilia Vega cited, quote, censorship both imposed and self-driven. It is dangerous for the show and dangerous for democracy. Anderson Cooper earlier walked away voluntarily. He was said to have been apprehensive of Weiss, according to people I spoke to. Weiss appointed Nick Bilton executive producer to run the show. He's a former tech columnist for The New York Times, a former investigative reporter for Vanity Fair, and he has produced documentaries.

The one thing he hasn't done is work in broadcast news.

All right. So what does Nick Bilton have in mind for the show?

Well, he has a remit from Weiss to reinvent the show for the digital age. He told staffers, quote, I'm here to lead this show also not preserve it under glass. He said he'd be taking soundings for 30 days and get back to them about his plans. He wants it, he says, to be more available than just every Sunday. Funnily enough, over the years, 60 Minutes has sought new ways to innovate. It's done so online and new spinoffs and franchises like 60 Minutes Sports. 60 Minutes 2 was there for a while before it blew up, and there were short video segments on a failed platform called Quibi. All major news outlets, to be fair to Weiss here, are seeking to find a path to digital salvation. In Bilton's case, he has the backing of the Ellisons, who own Oracle, as I mentioned, also control TikTok US, are intending to get CNN as well in another big corporate takeover. So Bilton is familiar with them covering the tech world. His opening memo, I must say, was about innovation and not, not about ideology.

Tell us about what the reward and the risk is for Barry Wise here.

Well, look, she's been here since last fall. She initially tried to change and take over the CBS Evening News, which was flagging before she arrived. She named Tony Dukopol as the anchor there. It seems to be lagging, uh, since he has been put in place. It's often below 4 million viewers a night. There's been one headline after another about internal dissent. 60 Minutes itself is the real prize for CBS. It's its top-rated news program. It works so well because it was an insular culture and so devoted to its approach. Under Tanya Simon over the past year, the show was up 9% in the ratings. So if Weiss makes this a big hit online and on other platforms with new audiences, she'll be able to ride on that a long time. If it tanks, that's on her, and her critics will take that as validation.

All right, so David, so what should we look Next.

So the Ellisons, through Skydance Media, only took over CBS's parent company last summer with the approval of Trump's antitrust regulators. Now they're awaiting approval from basically those same antitrust regulators for their massive takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery, which is, of course, the parent company of HBO and CNN, among other properties. That could go through before the next season of 60 Minutes starts, though there might well be legal challenges to it. People inside both CBS and CNN are already speculating and concerned about what role Weiss might play in leading the cable news giant in the years to come.

That's NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik. David, thanks.

You bet.

And that's Up First for Friday, May 29th. I'm Emilio Martinez.

And I'm Steve Inskeep. Today's Up First was edited by Tina Krya, Anna Yukhaninov, Emily Cobb, Mohamed El Bardisi, and Lindsay Totty. It was produced by Ziad Butch and Nia Dumas. Our director is Christopher Thomas, who has to be especially patient with us today. We get engineering support from David Greenberg. Our technical director is Carly Strange, and our executive producer is Jay Shaler. Join us tomorrow.