Despite Rupert Murdoch’s recent dismissal of sexual harassment problems at Fox as “nonsense,” one of Fox News’ top reporters, James Rosen, just left the network in the wake of multiple sexual harassment claims.

When Rosen abruptly left Fox News, shortly before Christmas, after 18 years, no reason was given for his departure. He had served as chief Washington correspondent for the network.

Now, we know why he left.

NPR’s David Folkenflik has the scoop:

Current and former Fox News Washington journalists characterize the Washington bureau as retaining something of a Mad Men ethos, with some male reporters frequently sending racy “topline” notes through the network’s internal messaging service.

The accusations against Rosen, who is married with young children, are more severe than that. He developed a reputation as a talented and ambitious journalist called “the professor” by former political anchor Brit Hume on the air for his interest in Watergate (Rosen wrote a book focusing on the life of former Attorney General John Mitchell that argued for a kinder re-assessment of his role in that Nixon-era scandal). Rosen has sent such messages, according to his former female co-workers. But in three instances he made overt physical and sexual overtures, according to the accounts of numerous former Fox News colleagues who heard about the incidents contemporaneously.

[...]

Late last spring, Rosen turned his attention to a younger female reporter, according to two colleagues who say she told them of the incident shortly after. Returning from a lunch together, Rosen physically tried to kiss her in the elevator ride back to the office, and once refused, attempted forcibly to kiss her again. According to a colleague, he then asked the reporter to keep the approach quiet and offered her unsolicited help in getting more time on Bret Baier's nightly political newscast, Special Report. The female reporter declined to comment for this story.

There’s plenty more about Rosen’s behavior in Folkenflik’s article at NPR.org.

For a taste of Rosen's reporting, watch him complain that President Obama devoted too much of his 2013 inauguration speech to civil rights below, from Fox’s January 21, 2013 coverage of his second inauguration.