Michaela Pereira is standing up in support of Gretchen Carlson.
The new HLN host has commended Carlson, a former Fox News personality, for breaking her silence about alleged sexual harassment from her former boss, Roger Ailes. The scandal led earlier this month to Ailes exiting his powerful 20-year stint atop the network.
“I think it takes a great deal of courage to do what she did,” Pereira told reporters Sunday at the TCA press tour in Beverly Hills. “I commend her for having the chutzpah to speak up.”
“I was hoping those kind of attitudes had died,” Pereira added, referring to the sexist culture that Carlson claimed existed at Fox News during her tenure. “I’ve been lucky, people don’t mess with me much.’
Robin Meade, Pereira’s HLN colleague, likewise said during her career she personally had not encountered the kind of environment that Carlson described.
“I didn’t come across it, I didn’t witness it and I haven’t been subjected to it,” Meade said. As for Carlson’s lawsuit, she added: “For me, it was eye-opening.”
Pereira is promoting her new Los Angeles-based HLN show aimed at West Coast viewers, part of the news network’s re-branding to focus on news and move away from true crime, a genre dominated by former HLN host Nancy Grace. Pereira was previously at HLN sister network CNN.