Last week, psychologist Wendy Walsh phoned in a sexual harassment complaint against Bill O’Reilly on the 21st Century Fox hotline. Yesterday, Fox’s parent company said it will have its lawfirm investigate the claim.
You may recall that Walsh’s experiences with O’Reilly were written up in an explosive New York Times article last week. Unlike the other women whose claims had been formally settled, Walsh was not bound by any confidentiality agreement. During a press conference on Monday, the former regular guest on The O’Reilly Factor relayed how a promised Fox contract and her regular appearances on the show disappeared after she spurned O’Reilly’s sexual advances.
You may also recall that O’Reilly responded to the Times report by saying he is “vulnerable to lawsuits” from people looking to make money off him and that, “In my more than 20 years at Fox News Channel, no one has ever filed a complaint about me with the Human Resources Department, even on the anonymous hotline.”
So now Walsh has filed her complaint on the hotline.
Yesterday, Walsh’s attorney, Lisa Bloom told CNN’s Reliable Sources that she had heard from Fox’s attorneys and had been promised an investigation. “This is not blowing over,” she said.
"This is not blowing over...there are going to be more claims," says @LisaBloom on Bill O'Reilly harassment scandal https://t.co/CQd6ZssYpg
— Reliable Sources (@ReliableSources) April 9, 2017
Reuters has since confirmed that Fox will investigate:
“21st Century Fox investigates all complaints and we have asked the law firm Paul Weiss to continue assisting the company in these serious matters," the company said in a statement.
Paul Weiss is the firm that investigated sexual harassment complaints in the wake of Gretchen Carlson’s bombshell complaint against Fox’s then-CEO Roger Ailes (who resigned soon thereafter).
Indeed, this is not blowing over.
Watch Walsh phone in her complaint on the corporate hotline below in a YouTube video published by Bloom on April 5, 2017.
Maybe Faux has met it’s Waterloo.
If he does show up I wonder if he’ll cover the Governor of Alabama resigning today. That would be awkward.