XPost: alt.tv.pol-incorrect, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.politics.usa

Inconsistencies are emerging in claims made by Cathy Areu, a once-
periodic Fox News guest, that she was harassed by some of the network’s
biggest names — including prime time anchor Tucker Carlson and Sean
Hannity. New emails obtained by Mediaite shed further light on the
case.

In a lawsuit filed on Monday in the Southern District of New York, Areu
claims she was harassed by Carlson, Hannity and other employees of the
network, and that she was largely barred from appearing after she
declined their advances. In an initial response the company said the
claims were “completely false.”

Over the last several days, records of Areu’s appearances on the
network and other publicly available information has undermined some of
her claims. New emails between Areu and the network’s employees seem to
add to those concerns.

Even more significantly, eyewitness accounts indicate Carlson’s wife
was with him on a key evening when Areu said Carlson promised her he
would be alone.

Claim against Sean Hannity

In the lawsuit, Areu claims, she was a “relatively regular” guest on
Hannity’s prime-time show until March 8, 2018. “On that day, Mr.
Hannity, on set and in front of the entire studio crew – and completely unsolicited – threw $100 on the set desk,” the suit claimed. “He then
began calling out to the men in the room and demanding that someone
take Ms. Areu out on a date for drinks at Del Friscos. He repeatedly
yelled, ‘who wants to take her on a date?’ ‘Take her on a date to Del Friscos.’”

Areu “was completely mortified,” the lawsuit added, “and made clear
that she was incredibly uncomfortable with Mr. Hannity’s misogynistic
behavior by quietly pleading with one of her friends in the room to
accept the money so that the humiliation would end. Thankfully, none of
the staff cooperated with Mr. Hannity, even after he repeatedly chided
one particular male employee for being ‘afraid to take out a beautiful
woman.'”

Emails provided by Fox News and reviewed by Mediaite, appear to show
that the male friend Areu referenced actually came to the set that
evening at Areu’s invitation.

“Is it ok for me to bring a guest?” Areu apparently wrote in an email
to a staffer earlier that day, referring to the guest as “Alex.” She
added, “He’s my good luck charm. He does yoga. Very calming. I run. I’m
nuts,” before signing the email with a winking face and her name.

The staffer replied: “Haha of course! No problem at all – will add him
to the security list,” signing the email with a smiling face.

According to Fox News, which hired an outside firm to investigate
Areu’s allegations, Hannity offered Areu and her friend $100 to get
drinks next door at Del Friscos after the appearance.

Areu then apparently sent two emails thanking Hannity and his staff.
The first, at 10:37 in the evening, said: “Thanks so much for having me
on. Way too much fun.”

The second, sent at 6:39 the next morning, included a picture of the
martini she said she bought at Del Frisco’s. “Please thank Sean for a
fun evening,” Areu wrote. “He shouldn’t have! … but We did exactly as
he and Alex’s had bet. Down to the pineapple martini.”

https://am14.mediaite.com/med/cnt/uploads/2020/07/Cathy-Areu-Email-2-1 -1536x794.png

https://am11.mediaite.com/med/cnt/uploads/2020/07/Cathy-Areu-Email-1-1 -1536x581.png

Areu’s lawsuit claimed that she believes the incident resulted in her
being barred from future appearances: “After this incident, and Ms.
Areu’s failure to ‘play along,’ Ms. Areu was hardly ever, if ever at
all, invited back to appear on ‘Hannity’ on Fox News Channel.”

According to Fox News, its records indicate Areu appeared on Hannity a
total of nine times between the date of the alleged incident, March 8,
2018, and July 3, 2019. Of that number, Fox said, five appearances took
place in the four months directly after the incident. A search by
Mediaite confirmed that Areu appeared repeatedly on the show following
the alleged incident, both with Hannity and with guest hosts.

The network claimed that on one of those subsequent appearances, Areu
thanked Hannity again for the drinks, and he again gave her and the
same friend money for another round of drinks.

Claim against Tucker Carlson

Additional inconsistencies involve Areu’s claim that she was harassed
during her “final 2018 appearance” on Carlson’s program. “Following the
show, Mr. Carlson changed on set into his leather jacket for the annual Christmas party that he told Ms. Areu he would only be attending for approximately 10 minutes,” the suit stated.

Reporters including The Spectator’s Amber Athey quickly noted Areu’s
final 2018 appearance with Carlson took place on November 30 of that
year, while the network’s annual Christmas party took place on December
10. Areu did not appear on the December 10 episode of Tucker Carlson
Tonight. Additionally, she appeared on a December 28 edition of the
program, guest-hosted that night by Mark Steyn.

While that final interview was archived on film website IMDB, an
attorney for Areu, Michael Willemin, told Mediaite his client had no recollection of it. He also said the Christmas party Areu was
referencing must have been a smaller holiday event held for Carlson’s
staff rather than the company-wide event.

“The incident with Tucker Carlson actually occurred on Nov. 30, not
Dec. 10,” Willemin said. “Ms. Areu misrecollected that the incident
occurred in December because it occurred following a winter/Christmas
segment. It is entirely possible that she appeared on Dec. 28, although
she doesn’t have a specific recollection of that and if she did appear,
it was not in Mr. Carlson’s physical presence.”

That claim leads to another issue. “Following the show,” Areu asserts
in her lawsuit, “Mr. Carlson, hardly making any effort to hide his
intentions, began telling Ms. Areu that he would be alone in New York
City that night, and specifically said that he would be staying alone
in his hotel room without any wife or kids.”

A source familiar with the event told Mediaite that Carlson’s wife did
attend the Tucker Carlson Tonight Christmas party. Fox News also told
Mediaite that Carlson hosted the entire party for his show’s staff
alongside his wife, who stayed in the hotel with him that evening.

“She didn’t go to the party so she can’t say who was there, but
certainly stands by what he told her,” Areu’s attorney said.

Areu’s claim that she was harassed by Carlson also relies on insight
into the Fox News host’s frame of mind: “Without question, Mr. Carlson
was probing to see whether Ms. Areu was interested in a sexual
relationship,” the suit said. Areu’s public comments about Carlson
since the alleged incident have also been warm. In one 2019 post on
Twitter, Areu wrote that Carlson “has always been polite to me.”

“Ms. Areu awkwardly sidestepped Mr. Carlson’s advances and declined to
spend the night at his hotel,” the lawsuit continued. “Mr. Carlson
promptly retaliated against Ms. Areu, who was featured on his show only
three times in 2019 and has not appeared once in 2020.”

Fox told Mediaite that company records indicate Areu appeared on
Carlson’s show four times in the four months following the incident,
the same number of times she appeared on the show in the four months
preceding it. “There is zero evidence of retaliation,” the network
claimed. The network also said there were eyewitnesses to Carlson and
Areu’s conversation who would contradict her account.

Claims against Gianno Caldwell, Howard Kurtz

Areu’s lawsuit named several individuals in addition to Hannity and
Carlson: MediaBuzz anchor Howard Kurtz; Fox analyst Gianno Caldwell;
and former daytime anchor Ed Henry, whom the network fired on July 1
over a sexual misconduct allegation made by another woman.

According to the suit, after seeing a picture of Caldwell with Ann
Coulter, Areu requested Caldwell introduce them — only to receive an
invitation from Caldwell to have lunch. She said she ignored the
message, following up with another request for an introduction.
Caldwell responded, she says, by telling her to buy him lunch, what she described as setting a “price to meet Ms. Coulter.”

Fox said in a statement Areu had asked Caldwell “many times for advice
on how to obtain a contract like Caldwell’s with Fox News” and that he
had assisted her “as a professional courtesy.” The network also quoted
texts to Mediaite where Areu allegedly continued texting after Caldwell declined her “aggressive” attempts to obtain Coulter’s contact
information, eventually following up in a message to Caldwell, “I am
[sic] meet her another way. Or not. It’s all good.”

Finally, Areu said she sought to meet Kurtz to talk about strategies
for winning full-time employment at Fox News, and that Kurtz — who
lives in Washington, D.C. — offered to meet Areu in his hotel lobby on
a day he was in New York City, texting: “I’m just at my hotel making
calls. Can you come to the Muse lobby at 7:15?”

Areu said she refused, and countered with a request for Kurtz to have
dinner with Areu and her friend. Kurtz declined, and made a further
comment that led her to presume he was seeking to meet “only if she
were alone and at his hotel for sexual reasons.”

Kurtz, according to Areu’s lawsuit, said “in sum and substance” that
she was “the only woman here who won’t come to my hotel room.”

Fox said Kurtz made his availability clear, telling her in an email
before the text exchange, “I may just have a little time to chat in the
hotel lobby.” When Kurtz declined to attend a dinner with Areu and her
friend, Fox said, Areu became particularly aggressive, writing by text
message: “What? I’ll be right there. I’m totally available right
now!!!!!!” The company said she followed up by emailing Kurtz: “What’s
your room number? What name are you under? What’s your cell? I’m coming
over. We can do it the easy way, or the hard way.” Kurtz did not reply
to those messages.

The issues with Areu’s claims may be a disservice to Areu’s co-
plaintiff, Jennifer Eckhart, a former producer who alleges, among other
things, that she was violently raped by Ed Henry. Eckhart included in
the suit graphic and abusive text messages she apparently received from
Henry, who has been fired from the network. Areu also claimed to have
received inappropriate texts from the former Fox News anchor. Henry, in
a statement issued by his lawyer, claimed his relationship with Eckhart
was consensual.

Fox declined to address either woman’s allegations against Henry, and
did not specifically challenge those claims in their statements
responding to the lawsuit.

The concerns about Areu’s allegations do not necessarily disprove her
case, but in a court of law, they could certainly make it far more
difficult for her to win.

“When the plaintiff’s allegations can be easily refuted by dates or
other facts, those allegations lose credibility,” said David
Warrington, a litigator at Kutak Rock in Washington, D.C. “That loss of credibility can have a cumulative effect.”


--
"It took a worldwide pandemic. It took a 35% plunge in the stock
market. It took quarantining. It took many small businesses closing. It
took canceling practically everything, to bring the USA economy back to
the Obama high mark."

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)