Abby Grossberg, a former producer on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, settled a pair of lawsuits against the network and Carlson for $12 million, her lawyer. Parisis Philippatos said Friday.
Grossberg sued the network, Carlson, its parent company and a number of executives this year allege she was harassed, retaliated against and arranged to take the fall in Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation suit against Fox News. He said he was later fired for going public with his claims. Fox News then denied his allegations.
In her lawsuit, the former producer, who also worked for Maria Bartiromo’s show, described Fox News as a toxic and misogynistic environment.
“We are pleased to have been able to resolve this matter without further litigation,” a Fox News spokesperson said in a statement.
Dominion accused the two Fox News shows of defamation, and Grossberg was intimately involved in the production of some of the contested broadcasts, according to documents released in the case. Fox News settled Dominion’s lawsuit for $787.5 million in April, moments before opening arguments were to be heard in court.
Dominion said Fox News had allowed baseless conspiracy theories to proliferate on air about the company’s “tampering” of voting machines in the 2020 presidential election against Donald Trump.
Grossberg was an active figure in the Dominion litigation — his deposition and emails were released amid thousands of pages of evidence made public during the court proceedings.
In the documents, Grossberg sought to correct his deposition testimony, which he said had been improperly influenced by Fox News lawyers. His lawyers released taped interviews from his time at the network and suggested that Fox News lawyers had not properly collected discovery. A Fox News spokesman said at the time that the network had “fulfilled its discovery obligations.”
Dominion’s lawyers played some of the audio in court, prompting a Delaware judge to sanction Fox News for withholding evidence.
In a statement, Grossberg said she was glad the network was taking her allegations seriously.
“While I stand by my publicly filed claims and allegations, in light of today’s $12 million settlement, under which I have now withdrawn those claims, I am pleased that Fox News has took me and my legal claims seriously. I am hopeful, based on our discussions with Fox News today, that this resolution represents a positive step for the Network in terms of its treatment of women and minorities in the workplace,” he said.
Days after Fox News settled with Dominion, it abruptly canceled “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” one of the most-watched shows on American cable news.
Carlson said NPR of Grossberg’s accusations: “I know nothing about her. I never met her.”
In a tweetformer Carlson producer Justin Wells said he and other Carlson employees named in the lawsuit “deny Ms. Grossberg’s claims and allegations against Tucker Carlson and her team. However, we are pleased that Fox has resolved this matter and that all parties can move forward.”
