In the suit, a specific occasion is mentioned in which Tantaros was called into Ailes’ office and told to turn around so he could “get a good look”.
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“Perhaps the most shocking encounter of all”, the suit claims, “was a Spring 2015 meeting between Tantaros and Fox News Senior Executive, Defendant William Shine (‘Shine”), during which Tantaros sought relief from Ailes’s sexual harassment and Briganti’s retaliatory media vendetta against her.
Her suit says the news network “operates like a sex-fueled, Playboy Mansion-like cult, steeped in intimidation, indecency and misogyny”.
Fox News host Andrea Tantaros disappeared from the network earlier this year, sparking concerns as to her professional whereabouts.
So far, Fox has had nothing to say about this new lawsuit, but Ailes continues to deny the allegations against him, and Bill Shine, the new co-president, said a couple of weeks ago, that he was never told by Tantaros of harassment by Ailes.
According to Tantaros, the suspension was not the first time Ailes and other Fox executives had retaliated against her for resisting a culture that sexualized female hosts.
Tantaros alleged that Ailes’s “actions were condoned by his most senior lieutenants, who engaged in a concerted effort to silence Tantaros by threats, humiliation, and retaliation”. Implicated as well is Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, who the suit alleges made “unwanted advances” toward Tantaros.
When asked about his wife’s reaction to the allegations, Brown said: “She knows I was sexually abused as a kid and these things are pretty personal and I take those types of sexual innuendo and all that stuff pretty seriously and don’t perpetuate that kind of narrative”.
The lawsuit also accuses Fox News of setting up fake Twitter accounts, known as “sock puppets”, to harass her online.
Tantaros’s attorney, Judd Burstein, says that during a recent contract dispute she was offered a sum “in the seven figures” if she would renounce her harassment allegations against Ailes and others at the network.
Tantaros is the most recent in a string of women who have accused former Fox News president Roger Ailes of sexual harassment and misconduct.
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Fox News did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Former US Senator Scott Brown allegedly made sexually inappropriate comments to her and put his hands on her lower waist. She charged that top Fox network executives “punished” her for complaining about sexual harassment in the workplace. “She made multiple harassment and hostile-workplace complaints”, her lawyer, Judd Burstein, told NY magazine earlier this month. She also added that he once called The Five co-host Kimberly Guilfoyle a “Puerto Rican whore”.
