Fox News CEO Roger Ailes Really Likes Luring Women into Cars
The backseat of a moving vehicle is one of his favorite places. (Allegedly.)
On Wednesday, erstwhile Fox & Friends morning show co-host Gretchen Carlson filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Fox News founder and CEO, Roger Ailes. Attorneys allege that Ailes, 76, came on to Carlson repeatedly and aggressively. Also that he "unlawfully retaliated” and “sabotaged her career because she refused his sexual advances and complained about severe and pervasive sexual harassment." Carlson was let go by Fox News last month. Ailes has denied the accusations.
It's going to be a tough sell, because six additional women have now come forward with accusations of Allies’ inappropriate conduct, some dating back as far as the 1960s.
One of the women, Kellie Boyle, a former field advisor of the Republican National Committee, describes a 1989 incident to New York magazine thusly:
"...I went in and mentioned to him I was going down to D.C. the following week to sign a major contract with the National Republican Congressional Committee. He said, ‘I’m going to be in D.C. too. Would you like to have dinner before you go in?’ So we had a nice dinner at a restaurant in Union Station. There was nothing untoward about it at all. He had a driver and a car, and after dinner he said, ‘Can I take you to your friend’s?’ So we get in the car and that’s when he said, ‘You know if you want to play with the big boys, you have to lay with the big boys.’ I was so taken aback. I said, ‘Gosh I didn’t know that. How would that work?’ I was trying to kill time because I didn’t know if he was going to attack me. I was just talking until I could get out of the car. He said, ‘That’s the way it works,’ and he started naming other women he’s had. He said that’s how all these men in media and politics work—everyone’s got their friend. I said, ‘Would I have to be friends with anybody else?’ And he said, ‘Well you might have to give a blowjob every once in a while.’"
Which is similar an incident detailed by Carlson:
"Afterward we got into his car and he gave the driver the address of the friend I was staying with. We were sitting in the backseat together when suddenly he threw himself on top of me and stuck his tongue down my throat. He was all over me, and I can still feel his mouth on my mouth. It makes me a little sick even now. I pulled away from him, desperate to get away. Luckily, we were close to where I was being dropped off. I jumped out of the car and slammed the door without a word, racing into my friend’s apartment building."
The backseat of a moving vehicle is Ailes’ third-favorite place to sexually harass young women, after his office and the set of The Mike Douglas Show, where “he had a room.” If you're interested in the other accusations, or would just like a page to bookmark for emetic purposes (one woman who Ailes tried coercing into oral sex describes his genitals as being “like raw hamburger meat”; she was 16-years old at the time), the full New York magazine story is here.
