“60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley accused CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss of “murdering” the venerable newsmagazine at a staff meeting Monday with Nick Bilton, the technology journalist tapped to oversee the show, according to an audio recording and a source who was in the room.

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Bilton, a documentary filmmaker and former tech columnist at The New York Times, told “60 Minutes” staff members that Weiss “loves this institution,” the source said. Pelley interrupted Bilton and pushed back.

“She is murdering ‘60 Minutes.’ She does not love this place,” Pelley told Bilton, according to the audio recording. “She was brought in to kill it, and she’s been doing exactly that.”

The meeting was intended to be Bilton’s introduction to the “60 Minutes” team. In another tense exchange, the source said, Pelley said Weiss has “no qualifications for her job” and told Bilton he has “slender qualifications” for his new role as executive producer of “60 Minutes,” the leading newsmagazine on television.

CBS News spokespeople did not immediately respond to NBC News’ requests for comment. The details of the meeting were first reported by The Guardian.

Weiss, a former opinion columnist and the founder of the website The Free Press, hired Bilton as part of a push to overhaul CBS News and “60 Minutes.” In a major shake-up Thursday, CBS ousted Bilton’s predecessor, “60 Minutes” veteran Tanya Simon, and fired two correspondents, Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega.

Alfonsi and Weiss clashed late last year over a last-minute decision to postpone a “60 Minutes” segment about the Trump administration’s deporting Venezuelan men to a notorious prison in El Salvador. Alfonsi said the story was pulled for “political reasons”; Weiss said it was “not ready” for air.

The story, titled “Inside CECOT,” ultimately aired in January. It included statements from the White House and the Department of Homeland Security that were not in the original version.

Pelley on Monday morning deplored the “catastrophic” changes Weiss has made to the “CBS Evening News,” a show he hosted from 2011 to 2017. He asked Bilton why he had accepted a position at a show “knowing that you would never be welcomed here,” according to the recording.

“I don’t believe that will be the case,” Bilton replied, according to the recording.

“I have been a journalist for 25 years, Scott. I have sat and talked with incredibly powerful people like you have,” Bilton added. “None of it intimidates me, OK?”

Earlier in the meeting, Bilton attempted to allay concerns that “60 Minutes” would radically change under his tenure. “The journalism is the journalism,” he said in part, according to the recording. “That is why I am here. That is why we are all here.”

Weiss was appointed last fall by David Ellison, a technology scion who took over CBS’ parent company, Paramount, in an $8 billion merger with his media company, Skydance.

Ellison is poised to take control of Warner Bros. Discovery, the owner of CNN, in a $110 billion deal. It is unclear whether CBS News and CNN would be combined or operate independently if regulators approve the merger.

CBS News legend Dan Rather and dozens of other journalists urged Ellison in a letter released Monday to “uphold the principle of editorial independence.”

“We urge you to send a clear message to your staff, your viewers, and the broader public that you respect and value editorial independence and press freedom,” the signers said.

Paramount Skydance did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the letter Monday.

Bill Owens, the former executive producer of “60 Minutes” who resigned a year ago, took issue with CBS News’ current leadership in a speech on Monday night.

He called Weiss “an opinion writer who is best known for being an ideologue,” and said his former colleagues were fired without any cause given.

“They were fired by people who don’t even know what we do. Who don’t actually care,” Owens said at the New York Press Club Journalism Awards. He mentioned that Bilton has never worked in television news.

In the final seconds of Monday’s “60 Minutes” staff meeting, the source said, Bilton said he looked forward to speaking with staff members one-on-one in the coming days and weeks. “Enjoy the bagels,” Bilton said before he left the room.

Seconds later, the people in the room applauded for Pelley, according to the recording.

“These people disgust him,” according to a person close to Pelley. “They don’t do what Scott and ‘60’ do or stand for.”