In case you missed it, Greta Van Susteren abruptly resigned from Fox News Channel on Tuesday after 14 years. Surprisingly, the fair and balanced network didn’t even give Van Susteren a chance to say goodbye on the air. Not only had been one of its pillars for 14 years, but she had initially been one of Roger Ailes’ staunchest defenders when news of his debauched and potentially criminal harassment of women broke in full.
Well, we may have found out why on Friday. It seems that the scales fell off Greta’s eyes when she read the details of Gretchen Carlson’s lawsuit against Ailes. Now she is blaming her former bosses at both Fox News and parent company 21st Century Fox for not doing more to keep Ailes in line.
You may recall that soon after the scandal broke, Van Susteren adamantly declared that there was “no ring of truth” to Carlson’s claims, saying she herself had never been harassed. Reportedly, she even went as far as to threaten to quit if Ailes were pushed out. However, as more details came out and more women–such as Megyn Kelly, Rudi Bakhitar, and Andrea Tantaros–came forward, Greta quietly backed off her previous unfettered support. She even went as far as to make two posts on her now-deleted GretaWire blog applauding Carlson for coming forward.
However, on Friday morning, Van Susteren took to Facebook to let her former bosses have it for how they (mis)handled the Ailes situation. She said that she’d had a chance to read Carlson’s complaint, and found that it portrayed a situation that was “inconsistent with what was my experience and information” at Fox News. While she conceded it may have been because she is based in Washington–200 miles from Fox News headquarters in Manhattan–she apologized for not taking “a civil complaint written by lawyers” more seriously.
Greta then turned her guns on Ailes’ bosses.
“I regret that Roger Ailes was not supervised by those in a public corporation who had the duty to supervise him. This included his seniors, the CFO’s of both Fox News Channel and 21CF (and its predecessor NewsCorp), the Board of Directors and what I assume this public corporation had, outside auditors. Checks written that were suspicious should have been spotted.”
If I’m reading this right, Van Susteren just delivered an ominous warning to the Murdochs and the senior leadership of both Fox News (which is still run by Ailes’ former flunkies) and 21st Century Fox. As a lawyer, Greta is well aware that corporations–especially public ones–are responsible for their officers’ misconduct. Carlson, Bakhitar, Tantaros, and others maintain that they complained to Fox News senior management about Ailes’ debauchery–only to get blown off.
Apparently somebody must have told the Murdochs that any woman who could prove this could draw blood in court. Hours before Greta took to Facebook, Fox News paid Carlson a $20 million settlement and offered her an unreserved apology. To my mind, Van Susteren was giving her former bosses a lawyerly warning–you’d better settle with the other women too unless you want to get crucified at trial.
Greta apparently thinks that Fox News could have some explaining to do for reasons other than turning a blind eye to Ailes’ harassment. As we now know, Ailes had more or less unfettered control over Fox News’ budget; the Murdochs simply rubber-stamped his proposals. Van Susteren wondered why no out-of-the-ordinary requests–such as for a massive surveillance operation that may have stooped to phone hacking–didn’t draw further scrutiny. Indeed, Tantaros’ lawyer has already hinted that he has evidence of skullduggery at Fox News that goes beyond sexual harassment.
This was actually the second mea culpa from a current or former Fox News personality in less than 24 hours. The previous day, Geraldo Rivera apologized on Facebook for “stubbornly discounting” the allegations of Ailes’ accusers. Geraldo says that the scales only came off his eyes when Ailes was told to resign or be fired, saying that the Murdochs wouldn’t have “turned the world upside down but for good cause.”
It would be easy to discount one person having the scales come off. But a second person–especially if that second person was probably Fox News’ second most-prominent woman? Something tells me that this trickle is going to turn into a flood.
