A former Fox News producer has claimed in a lawsuit that members of the staff of Tucker Carlson’s show put images of former Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a bathing suit up throughout their office to mock her for her appearance.
Abby Grossberg, the former producer, filed a discrimination suit against Fox News, Carlson, and several other executives and producers in a Manhattan court on Monday.
Ms Grossberg, who started working at Tucker Carlson Tonight in September 2022, said she was stunned upon starting her job “to be greeted by many large and blown-up photographs of Nancy Pelosi in a plunging bathing suit revealing her cleavage”.
“The images were plastered onto her computer and elsewhere throughout the office,” the suit alleges. “Apparently, the ‘joke’ was that Speaker Pelosi looked terrible in a bathing suit.”
Fox News said in a statement to Insider that it will “vigorously defend” the company against Ms Grossberg’s complaints, but declined to comment specifically on the allegations involving the images of Ms Pelosi.
Ms Grossberg claims in the suit that the treatment of Ms Pelosi, an active member of the House of Representatives who was in 2022 third in line for the presidency, was indicative of a pervasive atmosphere of misogyny, abuse and toxicity at the company.
Ms Grossberg also states that Fox News executives consistently demeaned and denegrated network host Maria Bartiromo, her former boss. She alleges that Carlson’s producers argued over which female candidate for governor of Michigan was “hotter” and “more f******,” and that one producer said a room set aside for employees to pump breast milk was a “waste of space.”
According to Insider, Ms Grossman also claims in her suit that Fox News pressured her into giving misleading statements in her testimony in Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6bn lawsuit against Fox News. The network denied that claim.
