Madeleine Carlisle, Stephen Colbert’s Daughter, Hired by The Atlantic After ‘60 Minutes’ Exit
The journalist, who previously worked as an associate producer at the CBS news program, is joining the magazine as a staff writer.
After leaving 60 Minutes, journalist Madeleine Carlisle — who happens to be the daughter of Stephen Colbert — has landed at The Atlantic.
The Atlantic editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg announced that Carlisle was joining the magazine as a staff writer on Friday. “A bunch of us sensed that, sooner or later, she would be coming back to us,” he said in his note about Carlisle, who was a fellow for the magazine in its 2018-2019 class.
He added, “As a fellow on the Politics team, she wrote about a Florida woman whose nephew was killed in the Parkland shooting, and about President Trump’s unfulfilled promises to GM workers in Ohio. We’ve been so happy to watch her become an outstanding journalist, and we’re thrilled that she’s rejoining The Atlantic.”
After her time at The Atlantic, Carlisle was hired as a reporter at Time magazine, where she covered politics, gender and legal issues. She moved to 60 Minutes in 2022, where she remained until earlier this month. On August 4, the newsletter Status reported that Carlisle had resigned as part of a larger brain drain from the newsmagazine. In his hiring announcement, Goldberg mentioned that at the CBS program Carlisle worked with former correspondents Scott Pelley, Anderson Cooper and Cecilia Vega on their pieces and was a member of a team that was Emmy-nominated.
Carlisle’s exit came at a time of turbulence for the program, which has been rocked by accusations of meddling under new ownership from David Ellison’s Paramount Skydance. After Ellison tapped The Free Press founder Bari Weiss as the editor in chief of CBS News, outgoing staffers including former 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens and correspondents Scott Pelley and Cecilia Vega have made serious accusations of new leadership of interfering with their editorial independence.
Carlisle’s father Colbert has also been swept up in the changes sweeping CBS. The former host of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert — and an outspoken Trump critic — saw his show canceled as former parent company Paramount Global sought to close a merger with Skydance in the first year of a second Trump administration. CBS at the time called it a “purely financial decision,” an explanation that prompted skepticism in Hollywood.
Goldberg also announced on Friday that The Atlantic was hiring former Vibe and Billboard editor in chief Danyel Smith as a staff writer. Smith was previously a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, where she wrote a major piece about her professional experience with Sean “Diddy” Combs.
