Tucker Carlson’s longtime Fox News producer and “right-hand man” is being sued for alleged sexual assault and harassment by a former employee at the network.
Justin Wells is accused of aggressively forcing himself on Andrew Delancey in 2008 before retaliating when his advances were rejected in a civil lawsuit filed on Monday under the New York Adult Survivors Act.
Mr Wells, who was fired by Fox News in April with Carlson and now works as an executive producer on his Tucker on X show, has denied the claims through his lawyer.
According to the suit, Mr Wells contacted the complaint over Facebook in 2007 while he was working for a Fox station in Florida to say he had “caught [his] eye”, and encouraged him to seek a job in the New York bureau.
Mr Delancey was then hired as a producer for Fox News Edge where he regularly interacted with Mr Wells, who held a senior producer role for Greta Van Susteren’s show On the Record.
Mr Wells began “showering Mr Delancey with gifts” within one week of his arrival and would set tasks for the junior staffer even though they did not work on the same show.
Tucker Carlson’s top producer Justin Wells has been accused of sexual assault— (REUTERS)
Mr Delancey alleges he was invited by Mr Wells to staff drinks about a month after starting at Fox, and they arranged to meet outside his building.
Mr Wells then suggested they go up to his apartment for a “pregame” cocktail, where he pushed Mr Delancey onto his bed and “violently forced his tongue” down his colleague’s mouth, according to the filing.
Mr Wells allegedly attempted to rip off Mr Delancey’s jeans and repeatedly grabbed his genitals.
In a state of shock, Mr Delancey claims he shouted “no” and attempted to reason with Mr Wells by reminding him he had a boyfriend and they were due to meet Fox colleagues at a nearby gay bar, the Barracuda Lounge.
Fox News had a notorious reputation for allowing sexual harassment to run rampant, the suit alleges— (REUTERS)
When Mr Wells offered to show him the view from a rooftop deck, Mr Delancey saw it as a chance to escape, but was assaulted again as the two men walked up a stairwell, the complaint states. He left the apartment shortly afterwards.
Mr Delancey claims that he told colleagues about the alleged sexual assault. He said he was advised by a supervisor not to report any concerns of inappropriate conduct to Fox’s HR department.
His lawyers state that Fox News was notorious for allowing sexual harassment to “run rampant”, citing previous cases against former CEO Roger Ailes, and high-profile on-air personalities Bill O’Reilly and Carlson.
Mr Delancey accused Mr Wells of assault and battery, and alleges that Fox News was negligent for allowing the alleged sexual harassment to continue.
In a statement to The Independent, Mr Wells’ attorney Harmeet Dhillon described the lawsuit as “meritless” and said her client “denies the allegations unequivocally and will contest them vigorously”.
Carlson said in a statement he did not believe the allegations were credible.
“As a general matter, if you believe you’ve been the victim of a sex crime, you have a moral obligation to alert police, so it doesn’t happen to someone else,” he said. “If you wait 15 years to cash in with a civil suit, no one should take you seriously. I certainly don’t.”
Justin Wells now works as a producer on Carlson’s streaming show on X— ( Associated Press)
Mr Delancey’s attorneys Filippatos PLLC told The Independent that Carlson’s statement was a “classic example of the tactics that people with power and influence use to insulate themselves from accountability and silence victims”.
“Mr Carlson’s credibility on this — and any other topic for that matter — now hovers at zero especially since revelations surrounding the Dominion settlement and his termination by Fox News have established a public record of Mr Carlson’s propensity to mislead his audience.”
Fox News did not respond to a request for comment.
In June, former Fox News producer Abby Grossberg settled two harassment lawsuits against the network and Carlson for $12m.
Mr Delancey’s lawsuit was filed shortly under the New York Adult Survivors Act shortly before a one-year window closed which removed the statute of limitations for sexual misconduct.
