In 1993, he started working as a writer-producer on Late Night with David Letterman, which aired on NBC. Burnett ultimately made the move to CBS with Letterman when The Late Show was picked up at that network.

W hen CBS embarked on the project of replacing David Letterman as the host of The Late Show, in 2014, the network spared no expense. It hired Stephen Colbert, who had collected Emmys and acclaim while hosting his Comedy Central talk show,

CBS also recently canceled host Taylor Tomlinson's “After Midnight,” which aired after “The Late Show.” The announcement came two days after Colbert spoke out against CBS Global settling with President Donald Trump over a “60 Minutes” story.