Bari Weiss vs. transgender people

Bari Weiss is an American opinion writer, author, and key historical figure in promoting and platforming anti-transgender extremism. Weiss is founder of anti-trans group blog The Free Press. In 2025, Weiss sold the blog to Paramount and was named editor-in-chief of CBS News.

While at the New York Times, Weiss popularized the intellectual dark web (IDW), a group of public intellectuals whose reactionary and anti-progressive views are also often anti-trans. The IDW has been described as “a gateway to the far right.”

Weiss has platformed, appeared with, promoted, and logrolled for other anti-transgender extremists and activists, including J.K. Rowling, Alice Dreger, Jesse Singal, Katie Herzog, Abigail Shrier, Sue Evans, Suzy Weiss, Julie Bindel, Hannah Barnes, Carole Hooven, Leighton Woodhouse, Michael Shellenberger, J. Michael Bailey, Aaron Sibarium, Maud Maron, Jamie Reed, Andrew Sullivan, Lisa Selin Davis, and Helen Lewis.

Background

Bari M. Weiss was born March 25, 1984 to Lou and Amy Weiss, owners of Weisslines, a flooring retailer. Weiss has three siblings, including anti-trans activist Suzy Weiss. Weiss grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. After high school, Weiss lived in Israel for about a year through the Nativ College Leadership Program sponsored by United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism.

Weiss earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University in 2007.

Weiss is a prominent activist in pro-Zionist causes, a self-described “Zionist fanatic.” An article in Jewish Currents noted that “Weiss has a long history of claiming to support free speech while trying to curtail the speech of Palestinian rights advocates.” While at Columbia in 2004, Weiss helped promote but does not appear in the video Columbia Unbecoming, a collection of testimonies from 14 students who felt they were not able to express pro-Zionist views freely at Columbia University and Barnard College. The film was backed by The David Project, a pro-Israel group based in Boston that became Hillel in 2019. In December 2004 Weiss was involved in creating the organization Columbians for Academic Freedom, which targeted several professors in Columbia’s Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures (MEALAC) department. Weiss stated that Columbia Unbecoming was edited to include published comments by the targeted professors: “We put the mentions of the publications in the film to expose the racism of these professors.” Three of the targeted professors took leaves of absence following a Columbia investigation that largely cleared them of wrongdoing. In 2006, Weiss was editor of The Columbia Current, a student publication about Jewish affairs.

A 2005 article in the Columbia Blue and White noted:

Her name has become a buzzword in the suspended but probably not defunct MEALAC intimidation scandal. But once more, for the record, it is Bari Weiss, C’07. It began with a skimpy documentary from Boston-based Zionist group The David Project, which featured several Columbia students accusing Middle East Studies professors of intimidation. But the debate has since sprawled to include defenders of Israel and Palestine, students’ rights and professors’ rights, what constitutes academic freedom, and has pitched one small chunk of passionate students against another. As one of four founders of the controversial students’ rights group Columbians for Academic Freedom (CAF), and the only one yet to graduate, Bari seems next in line to succeed her new boyfriend and former General Studies Student Body President Ariel Beery, G’05, as the voice of slighted students everywhere.

Even though Bari has been to Israel about a dozen times, and deferred coming to Columbia for a year to work on a kibbutz, she doesn’t fit perfectly into what some conservative and Zionist activists seek in a talking head. For one thing, Bari wants to see a Palestinian state. Moreover, her activist work as the founder of the Columbia Coalition for Sudan may prevent her from becoming the new face of the Ziorganizers.

In 2007, while living in Israel on a Dorot Fellowship, Weiss wrote for Haaretz and The Forward. From 2011 to 2013, Weiss served as a senior editor at Tablet, then worked at the Wall Street Journal from 2013 to 2017. From 2017 until resigning in 2020, Weiss was a staff writer and editor for the opinion section of the New York Times.

While at the New York Times, Weiss published a 2018 puff piece promoting the “renegades” and “heretics” of the intellectual dark web. Anti-trans historian Alice Dreger backed out just prior to publication. People Weiss mentions in the piece include Sam Harris, Eric Weinstein, Bret Weinstein, Dave Rubin, Heather Heying, Jordan Peterson, Ben Shapiro, Douglas Murray, Maajid Nawaz, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Christina Hoff Sommers, Joe Rogan, Candace Owens, Milo Yiannopoulos, Charlie Kirk, Richard Dawkins, Claire Lehmann, Debra Soh, Michael Shermer, Steven Pinker, Stefan Molyneux, Mike Cernovich, Alex Jones, Charles Murray, and Kanye West.

Am I a member of this movement? A few months ago, someone suggested on Twitter that I should join this club I’d never heard of. I looked into it. Like many in this group, I am a classical liberal who has run afoul of the left, often for voicing my convictions and sometimes simply by accident. This has won me praise from libertarians and conservatives. And having been attacked by the left, I know I run the risk of focusing inordinately on its excesses — and providing succor to some people whom I deeply oppose.

Weiss authored the 2019 book How to Fight Anti-Semitism. The tactics Weiss learned though pro-Zionism reflect the similar tactics Weiss has used to attack trans rights, framing it as a “free speech” debate where anti-trans activists are fearless truth-tellers being oppressed and “cancelled” by “illiberal” opponents.

After anti-trans extremist Elon Musk bought Twitter in October 2022. Musk soon gave several writers access to internal Twitter documents. Dubbed the “Twitter Files,” the findings were released over the next several months. Authors were Bari Weiss as well as Matt Taibbi, Michael Shellenberger, Lee Fang, David Zweig, Alex Berenson, and Paul D. Thacker. Weiss published the second installment, on Twitter’s “visibility filtering” practices, on December 8, 2022. Then on December 12, 2022, Weiss published the fifth installment, regarding suspension of President Donald Trump’s Twitter account around the time of the January 6, 2021 United States Capitol attack.

Weiss was married to Jason Kass from 2013 to 2016 and married Nellie Bowles in 2021. They have two children.

Anti-transgender efforts

Weiss was a key figure in securing funding for anti-trans group Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism.

Weiss is also a founder of the University of Austin, a college conceived in 2021 by Joe Lonsdale, Pano Kanelos, Niall Ferguson, and Weiss. Anti-trans activists who have been listed as associated with the school include Coleman Hughes, Michael Shellenberger, Peter Boghossian, Richard Dawkins, Rob Henderson, Sohrab Ahmari, Jonathan Haidt, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Glenn Loury, Kathleen Stock, Andrew Sullivan, Steven Pinker, Caitlin Flanagan, Nadine Strossen, Tyler Cowen, and Larry Summers. One event sponsored by the school was a “debate” between Deirdre McCloskey and Kathleen Stock in which they largely agreed.

Weiss is the founder and editor of The Free Press (formerly Common Sense) and the host of the podcast Honestly. The Free Press has been described as “best known for anti-trans fearmongering.” In a 2024 New York Times profile, Matt Flegenheimer wrote:

Ms. Weiss and Ms. Bowles resettled in Los Angeles, telling associates it was a respite from the pitilessness of New York.

She assembled a small staff and promised to cover stories that others ignored while affording grace to those with whom she clashed.

At an early team retreat, where Ms. Weiss asked the group to share something that informed their values, she chose a clip from “Transparent,” the 2010s television series with a trans protagonist, which she said she found moving despite what she assumed were political differences with the show’s creator.

“Bari said that she’d chosen it because she never wanted to forget the humanity of those with whom she vehemently disagrees,” said an attendee, Megan Phelps-Roper, a former member of the Westboro Baptist Church (and now fierce opponent of its bigoted teachings) who worked with Ms. Weiss.

Podcast

Weiss began a podcast in 2021 titled Honestly with Bari Weiss and frequently has guests on to discuss their gender critical views, including:

References

Molloy, Parker (October 9, 2025). CBS News just made a terrible mistake. DAME https://www.damemagazine.com/2025/10/09/cbs-news-just-made-a-terrible-mistake/

Perry, Sophie (October 7, 2025). ‘Gender-critical’ queer journalist Bari Weiss appointed editor-in-chief of CBS News. PinkNews https://www.thepinknews.com/2025/10/07/bari-weiss-gender-critical-trans-cbs/

Redford, Patrick (October 6, 2025). Bari Weiss Signs Huge Deal To Usher CBS News Into Its Vichy Era. Defector https://defector.com/bari-weiss-signs-huge-deal-to-usher-cbs-news-into-its-vichy-era

Villareal, Daniel (October 6, 2025). Queer “anti-woke” journalist Bari Weiss is now CBS News’ editor-in-chief. That’s troubling. LGBTQ Nation https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2025/10/queer-anti-woke-journalist-bari-weiss-is-now-cbs-news-editor-in-chief-thats-troubling/

Wiggins, Christopher (October 6, 2025). Anti-trans queer journalist Bari Weiss named editor in chief of CBS News. The Advocate https://www.advocate.com/news/bari-weiss-cbs-news-chief

Wiggins, Christopher (October 6, 2025). Who is Bari Weiss, the right-wing anti-trans queer woman being given the keys to CBS News? The Advocate https://www.advocate.com/news/who-is-cbs-bari-weiss

López, Quispe (October 6, 2025). Who Is Bari Weiss? What to Know About the New CBS News Leader and Her Anti-Trans Past. them https://www.them.us/story/bari-weiss-cbs-news-free-press-anti-trans

Ferguson, Malcolm (October 2, 2025). Bari Weiss, Who Thinks Everything Is Woke, Will Be CBS Editor in Chief. Anti-woke, anti-trans, pro-Israel Bari Weiss will soon lead one of the biggest media companies in the U.S. The New Republic https://newrepublic.com/post/201302/bari-weiss-cbs-editor-in-chief

Mirkinson, Jack (September 4, 2025). Vile Grifters Are Taking Over Establishment Media. The Nation https://www.thenation.com/article/society/bari-weiss-free-press-cbs-news-paramount/

Hurwitz, Sophie (August 19, 2025). I Went to the Free Press Party for Under-30s. All I Got Was Ennui. The Nation https://www.thenation.com/article/society/i-went-to-the-free-press-party-for-under-30s-all-i-got-was-ennui/

Sweeney, Billie Jean (July 24, 2025). “A Shameful Chapter”: How Anti-Trans Disinformation Drowned Out Science and Gripped the Mainstream. Assigned Media https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/anti-trans-disinformation-drowned-out-science-mainstream

Staff report (November 15, 2024). “Scapegoating trans people isn’t it.” Jane Coaston’s Blistering Critique of Bogus Election Year Blame Game. GLAAD https://glaad.org/scapegoating-trans-people-isnt-it-jane-coastons-blistering-critique-of-bogus-election-year-blame-game/

Villareal, Daniel (November 8, 2024). Lesbian Fox News guest blames “gender fluidity” for Democrats’ Election Day losses. LGBTQ Nation https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2024/11/lesbian-fox-news-guest-blames-gender-fluidity-for-democrats-election-day-losses/

Green, Emma (June 5, 2023). Is It Possible to Be Both Moderate and Anti-Woke? A small nonprofit launched by the journalist Bari Weiss devolves into tribalism. The New Yorker https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-activism/is-it-possible-to-be-both-moderate-and-anti-woke

Ennis, Dawn (May 14, 2023). AAPA conference cancels anti-trans Bari Weiss after complaints. Los Angeles Blade https://www.losangelesblade.com/2023/05/14/aapa-conference-cancels-anti-trans-bari-weiss-after-complaints/

Carman, Ashley (April 21, 2023). A Podcast About J.K. Rowling’s ‘Cancellation’ Has Reached Over 5 Million Listeners. Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2023-04-21/bari-weiss-s-hit-podcast-about-j-k-rowling-s-beliefs-on-trans-people

Henry, Vesper; Tirell, Alyssa (April 13, 2023). Timeline: The unfolding saga between The Free Press and a Missouri gender clinic. Media Matters https://www.mediamatters.org/bari-weiss/timeline-unfolding-saga-between-free-press-and-missouri-gender-clinic

Zimmerman, E. Alexander (April 9, 2023). Opinion: Legacy media’s coverage of transgender people is disingenuous and irresponsible. Niner Times https://www.ninertimes.com/opinion/opinion-legacy-media-s-coverage-of-transgender-people-is-disingenuous-and-irresponsible/article_ef033df8-d684-11ed-90f7-03ed83da7462.html

Wiggins, Christopher (April 5, 2023). Mom’s Interview With Anti-Trans Media Draws Criticism After Teen Responds. The Advocate https://www.advocate.com/media/transgender-teen-mother-interview

Riedel, Samantha (April 6, 2023). A Trans Teen Is Debunking an Article That Attacked Their Gender Clinic. them https://www.them.us/story/trans-teen-debunking-gender-clinic-article

Urquhart, Evan (April 6, 2023). Emily Yoffe Takes Sides Against a Vulnerable Youth. Assigned Media https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/emily-yoffe-takes-sides

Cooper, Ryan (March 2, 2023). The Useful Idiots Fueling the Right-Wing Transphobia Panic. The American Prospect https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2023-03-02-right-wing-transphobia-panic/

Krueger, Katherine (March 2, 2023). Bari Weiss Is Full of Shit: Her big trans panic story turned out to be nonsense, just like everything else she does. Discourse Blog https://www.discourseblog.com/p/bari-weiss-is-full-of-shit

Urquhart, Evan (March 2, 2023). What is Bari Weiss’ “Free Press”? Assigned Media https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/what-is-the-free-press

Urquhart, Evan (February 10, 2023). Missouri Woman Claims Gender Clinic Pushes Transition on Youth. Assigned Media https://www.assignedmedia.org/breaking-news/reed-allegations-distorted-vague

Urquhart, Evan (December 9, 2022). The Anti-Trans Hate Account That Bari Weiss Says Is Yet Another Right-Wing Voice Censored by Twitter. Slate https://slate.com/technology/2022/12/twitter-files-bari-weiss-libsoftik-elon-musk.html

Weiss cites the platform’s treatment of Libs of TikTok, a Twitter account that remains active despite its connection to multiple acts of terror and intimidation from far-right extremists, including multiple bomb threats against a children’s hospital. This portrayal of Libs of TikTok as representative of accounts posting conservative views is alarming. […]

Weiss may be best known for a column introducing “the intellectual dark web,” a group of anti-progressive types fixated on the concept of cancel culture and the idea that liberals routinely censor conservative ideas. With the Twitter Files, she describes herself leading a team that has been given “broad and expanding access” to Twitter’s internal documents and communications. This group includes opinion writer Abigail Shrier, who is best known for writing Irreversible Damage, a book opposing transition for female-assigned people on the grounds that an unproven social contagion is the root cause of transmasculine identities.

It is unsurprising that this team highlighted the treatment of an account notorious for its anti-trans activity. But Libs of TikTok goes far beyond expressing political opinions about transgender issues. That would certainly be allowed under Twitter’s policies, which exist to curb harassment, violence, and hate speech, not opinions. In fact, Libs of TikTok has repeatedly highlighted specific individuals, events, and institutions with inflammatory language, often falsely suggesting they are guilty of heinous acts against young children. The account’s spotlight has repeatedly resulted in harassment and violent threats toward the individuals involved, in a process typically referred to as stochastic terrorism. Those targeted include doctors and hospitals that provide gender-affirming care for youth, teachers and schools with inclusive policies, and all-ages or youth-focused drag events.

Contrary to the extremist rhetoric, gender-affirming care is supported by all mainstream medical organizations as potentially lifesaving for young people with gender dysphoria. It is also perfectly possible to speak with children about the existence of transgender people and about families headed by same-sex parents in an age-appropriate, nonsexual way.

Winters, Kelley (October 9, 2021). Transgender Affirmation in Retrograde. Trans Policy Reform Blog https://transpolicyreform.wordpress.com/2021/10/09/transgender-affirmation-in-retrograde/

Gill-Peterson, Jules (September 13, 2021). From Gender Critical to QAnon: Anti-Trans Politics and the Laundering of Conspiracy. Stated disavowal of their own bias doesn’t account for how liberals rhetorically shelter political violence. New Inquiry https://thenewinquiry.com/from-gender-critical-to-qanon-anti-trans-politics-and-the-laundering-of-conspiracy/

Greenwald, Glenn (March 8 2018). NYT’s Bari Weiss Falsely Denies Her Years of Attacks on the Academic Freedom of Arab Scholars Who Criticize Israel. The Intercept_ https://theintercept.com/2018/03/08/the-nyts-bari-weiss-falsely-denies-her-years-of-attacks-on-the-academic-freedom-of-arab-scholars-who-criticize-israel/

Roth, Jordan (May 26, 2005). An academic freedom fighter. Jerusalem Post https://www.proquest.com/docview/319478492?sourcetype=Newspapers alt url [full text] https://www.meforum.org/campus-watch/an-academic-freedom-fighter

Swindler, Josie (September 2005). Campus Characters. [p. 5-6] The Blue and White https://s3.amazonaws.com/BWARCHIVE/2005/sep05.pdf

Coverage in anti-trans press

Stiles, Andrew (October 7, 2025). Liberal Media, Activists Silent as Bari Weiss Makes LGBT History at CBS News. Washington Free Beacon https://freebeacon.com/media/liberal-media-activists-silent-as-bari-weiss-makes-lgbtq-history-at-cbs-news/

Testa, Jessica (October 6, 2025). How Bari Weiss Won: At The Free Press, she battled “wokeness” and buddied up with billionaires. Now she’s the editor in chief of CBS News. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/06/business/media/bari-weiss-free-press-cbs-news.html

Flegenheimer, Matt (August 11, 2024). Bari Weiss Knows Exactly What She’s Doing. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/11/business/media/bari-weiss-free-press.html

Selected writing by Weiss

Weiss, Bari (July 15, 2023). When Ideology Corrupts Medicine—and How One Reporter Exposed it. A conversation with Hannah Barnes about the medical scandal at Tavistock, the UK’s flagship youth gender clinic. The Free Press https://www.thefp.com/p/when-gender-ideology-corrupts-medicine-tavistock

Weiss, Bari (July 14, 2020). Resignation letter. https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter [archive]

Stephens, Bret; Weiss Bari (October 10, 2018). Why Is Israel Scared of This Young American? New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/10/opinion/israel-lara-alqasem-bds.html

In March, the writer Andrew Sullivan described each of us as a “Zionist fanatic of near-unhinged proportions.” It was a cheap shot. The word “near” should not have been a part of the sentence.

Otherwise, we happily plead guilty as charged.

Weiss, Bari (May 8, 2018). Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/opinion/intellectual-dark-web.html

Weiss, Bari (September 12, 2017). Opinion: A Political Conservative Goes to Berkeley. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/12/opinion/conservative-berkeley-ben-shapiro.html

There’s no question that Ben Shapiro loves to provoke college students. He once brought a diaper to a campus speech to offer to “self-indulgent pathetic children who can’t handle anyone with an opposing point of view.” In another, while entertaining a question from a young woman who called for greater sensitivity toward transgender people, he shot back: “If I call you a moose are you suddenly a moose?”

Yet this sharp-tongued Never Trumper was also, according to the Anti-Defamation League, by far the most bullied Jewish journalist of 2016

Weiss, Bari (August 1, 2017). When Progressives Embrace Hate. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/01/opinion/womens-march-progressives-hate.html

We just saw what happens to legitimate political parties when they fall prey to movements that are, at base, anti-American. That is true of the populist, racist alt-right that helped deliver Mr. Trump the White House and are now hollowing out the Republican Party. And it can be true of the progressive “resistance” — regardless of how chic, Instagrammable and celebrity-laden the movement may seem.

Weiss, Bari (November 16, 2004). In the Name of Academic Freedom. Columbia Spectator https://www.columbiaspectator.com/2004/11/16/name-academic-freedom/