Lawyers for ex-Fox News producer suing for discrimination vow to bring 'meaningful changes' to network after Dominion settlement
- Lawyers for a former Fox News producer vowed to continue their legal fight on Tuesday.
- Abby Grossberg is suing the network, alleging discrimination.
A former producer at Fox News who alleges the company has an institutional bias against women remains "as committed as ever" to pursuing litigation against the company in the hopes of achieving real change there, her attorneys said in a statement on Tuesday.
Abby Grossberg, who worked as a producer for Tucker Carlson and Maria Bartiromo before being fired last month, is suing Fox News on the basis that her career was thwarted by what she claims was a culture of misogyny and antisemitism.
Fox News has denied the allegations, with a spokesperson telling Insider that her legal claims "have no merit."
Grossberg has also alleged that Fox News lawyers prodded her to make false statements for a deposition in the lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, which was settled Tuesday afternoon for $787.5 million. Last week her attorneys also said they found recordings on her electronic devices, of conversations between Fox News employees the likes of Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, that the company failed to hand over during discovery in the Dominion case.
Parisis G. Filippatos and Tanvir H. Rhaman, lawyers for Grossberg, suggested Tuesday that she is not eager to settle her case, at least not just yet. In a statement, they said: "While we congratulate Dominion on a truly precedent setting settlement, we cannot help but be reminded of how Fox News's penchant for paying out notoriously large settlements to resolve lawsuits exposing its unlawful conduct – whether it's troubling allegations of workplace discrimination and sexual harassment and misconduct, to accusations of spreading malicious lies – have unfortunately, to date, failed to bring about actual meaningful changes to the network's abhorrent culture of lawlessness."
The Fox News spokesperson told Insider in a statement: "FOX News Media engaged an independent outside counsel to immediately investigate the concerns raised by Ms. Grossberg, which were made following a critical performance review. Her allegations in connection with the Dominion case are baseless and we will vigorously defend Fox against all of her legal claims which have no merit."
In 2017, The New York Times reported that Fox News or Bill O'Reilly had entered into at least a half-dozen settlement agreements related to harassment claims leveled against the former network star. O'Reilly signed a new contract with the company the same year he paid a $32 million settlement agreement, The Times reported.
Grossberg's attorneys said their client, through the lawsuits she has filed in New York and Delaware, "remains committed as ever to obtaining vindication of Fox News's violations of not just her rights but the rights of others whose voices have been silenced or who fear retribution for exposing the truth." The goal, they claimed, is "bringing about truly real and meaningful institutional changes at Fox News through every vehicle available to us in our legal system."
Grossberg is not the only legal foe pledging to continue their fight against Fox News. In a statement on Tuesday, the election technology company Smartmatic said it "remains committed" to its own $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against the network.
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Editor's Note: This story has been updated with the full statement from Fox News and clarification that The New York Times reported Bill O'Reilly paid the $32 million settlement.