President Donald Trump reportedly lost his temper when 60 Minutes anchor Norah O’Donnell pressed him on a controversial pardon for a convicted cryptocurrency billionaire who just happens to have business ties to the Trump family — but that fiery exchange never made it to air. According to a report from The Daily Beast, CBS quietly cut the entire line of questioning from both the televised and “extended” versions of the interview.
The tense moment came near the end of O’Donnell’s interview with Trump. She brought up the pardon of Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, who pleaded guilty to money laundering violations before being released — right around the same time Trump’s sons were getting deep into their own crypto empire.
“This is a question about pardons,” O’Donnell began. “The Trump family is now perhaps more associated with cryptocurrency than real estate. You and your son, your sons, Don Jr. and Eric, have formed World Liberty Financial with the Witkoff family, helping to make your family millions of dollars. It’s in that context that I do want to ask you about crypto’s richest man, a billionaire known as C.Z. He pled guilty in 2023 to violating anti-money laundering laws.”
C.Z., O’Donnell noted, “previously struck a $2 billion deal with the Trump family’s cryptocurrency venture, World Liberty Financial.”
Trump instantly bristled. “I don’t know who he is,” he snapped, before adding, “I know he got a four-month sentence or something like that, and I heard it was a Biden witch hunt.”
When O’Donnell pushed further, asking whether he was concerned about the appearance of corruption, Trump’s patience snapped. “I can’t say, because — I can’t say — I’m not concerned,” he said, visibly irritated. “I don’t — I’d rather not have you ask the question. But I let you ask it. You just came to me and you said, ‘Can I ask another question?’ And I said, yeah. This is the question.”
According to The Beast, those moments never saw the light of day in CBS’s broadcast — not in the 28-minute primetime cut, nor the 73-minute “extended” version posted online. Both were advertised by Trump’s social media team as a “full interview.”
But the missing exchange surfaced anyway. A transcript published on the 60 Minutes Overtime site included the deleted section, revealing exactly how heated the back-and-forth became.
The timing raises eyebrows. CBS recently reached a settlement with Trump over a lawsuit claiming the network deceptively edited an interview with then–Vice President Kamala Harris last year. Meanwhile, the network is now run by a new executive reportedly sympathetic to Trump.
For critics, the decision to trim out a question that tied Trump’s family, money, and a high-profile pardon together looks like more than just a routine edit. It looks like protection.
What aired was a softer, cleaner version of Trump — the one his campaign would prefer people to see. What got cut was the uncomfortable reality: a president lashing out when confronted with questions about corruption, money, and the friends he’s willing to protect.
