A little over a month since her prominent appearance at the Republican National Convention, a report from The New Yorker’s Jane Mayer provides new information on how Kimberly Guilfoyle left her prior position at Fox News in the summer of 2018.
It was previously reported that the conservative attorney, who is now the Trump campaign’s finance chair and Donald Trump Jr.’s girlfriend, left her position as co-host of The Five during a sexual-misconduct investigation. But on Thursday, Mayer published the first details of the accusations against Guilfoyle, which were made by a former assistant who accused her boss of repeated sexual harassment:
The woman was hired in 2015, just out of college, to work as an assistant for Guilfoyle and another former Fox host, Eric Bolling. According to a dozen well-informed sources familiar with her complaints, the assistant alleged that Guilfoyle, her direct supervisor, subjected her frequently to degrading, abusive, and sexually inappropriate behavior; among other things, she said that she was frequently required to work at Guilfoyle’s New York apartment while the Fox host displayed herself naked, and was shown photographs of the genitalia of men with whom Guilfoyle had had sexual relations. The draft complaint also alleged that Guilfoyle spoke incessantly and luridly about her sex life, and on one occasion demanded a massage of her bare thighs; other times, she said, Guilfoyle told her to submit to a Fox employee’s demands for sexual favors, encouraged her to sleep with wealthy and powerful men, asked her to critique her naked body, demanded that she share a room with her on business trips, required her to sleep over at her apartment, and exposed herself to her, making her feel deeply uncomfortable.
The details come from a 42-page complaint drafted by the assistant’s attorneys and sent to Fox News executives. The complaint was never filed in court, because executives settled her claims for more than $4 million, according to Mayer. One of the most explosive claims was that Guilfoyle wanted the assistant to lie to a law firm investigating allegations of sexual harassment involving the assistant’s other boss, Eric Bolling:
In exchange for demonstrating what Guilfoyle called loyalty, she would work out a payment to take care of her—possibly, she said, with funds from Bolling. The assistant alleged that Guilfoyle mentioned sums as large as a million dollars, and also other inducements, including a private-plane ride to Rome, a percentage of Guilfoyle’s future speaking fees, and an on-air reporting opportunity.
While Guilfoyle has publicly denied any wrongdoing, The New Yorker provided new, corroborating evidence regarding Guilfoyle’s alleged behavior:
One current and one former Fox employee confirmed the assistant’s allegation that Guilfoyle had often shared lewd images, noting that she had shown photographs of male genitalia to them, too—some of romantic partners, others of fans. Another former employee described Guilfoyle showing pornographic videos in the office. Guilfoyle’s graphic sexual talk so upset hair-and-makeup artists at Fox that they lodged an internal complaint, triggering an investigation by the company.
The House that Roger Ailes built has been plagued by sexual-misconduct allegations and settlements. While in recent years, major Fox News names like Bill O’Reilly and Ailes himself have left the network in the wake of alleged sexual-misconduct scandals, just this year former host Ed Henry was accused in a lawsuit of rape.
