Abby Grossberg, the Fox News producer suing her former employer over claims she was pressured to provide misleading testimony in the Dominion Voting Systems lawsuit, has spilled more details about the emotional toll of working for Tucker Carlson.
In an interview on NPR’s “Morning Edition,” Grossberg revealed that the “antisemitism and the bullying and the gaslighting and the misogyny” of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” eventually let to her calling a crisis hotline.
“I was in tears, beside myself, talking to my best friend on the phone, whom I’ve known for 20 years, somebody who would never describe me as an anxious person, a sad person, a depressed person. He recommended that I call a crisis hotline. And I did,” Grossberg said. Calling the hotline was something Grossberg had never considered before. “It really shows me that bullying can tear anybody apart when it’s done systematically and routinely.”
Earlier this year, Grossberg filed two lawsuits, one in New York and one in Delaware. In them, she alleged alleged Fox attorneys directed her to give “shaded and/or incomplete answers during her sworn deposition testimony,” which damaged her reputation but “greatly benefitted Fox News.” Fox countered with a gag-order suit, which the network dropped in March. Days later Grossberg, who was on forced administrative leave, was fired. In addition to alleging that “Tucker Carlson Tonight” encouraged a problematic working environment, the former senior producer has also claimed that the now-fired Fox News host tried to spin a conspiracy theory about the Jan. 6 insurrection involving FBI agents.
The former senior producer also walked NPR’s Leila Fadel through exactly how her departure from Fox unfolded. When Grossberg finally complained to a supervisor, she was told “Tucker set the pace of the show.”
“Approximately two and a half hours later, they retaliated against me and summoned me to HR for a meeting where they came up with bogus accusations about me that they wanted me to sign,” Grossberg said.
The former Tucker Carlson employee also offered an example of the gaslighting she claims she routinely experienced. During this meeting with HR, Grossberg said her work environment was “so difficult to endure” between the misogyny, antisemitism and bullying that she had to go to the bathroom at times to compose herself so she wouldn’t cry at work.
“Literally five minutes late my boss said to me, ‘You just told us you go to the bathroom to cry because you can’t do your job,’” Grossberg said. “You start to question your own reality. They do that a lot at Fox.”
When pressed by Fadel about why she took the job in the first place, Grossberg admitted she thought the way Carlson behaved was merely an on-air persona. “Unfortunately I was wrong,” Grossberg said. For her, both her lawsuits and the Dominion lawsuit are proof that Fox News does not care.
“They don’t care about their audience, and they don’t care about their employees, and they don’t care about telling the truth, and they don’t care about women. All they care about are ratings and revenue. It also shows that they believe their viewing audience is stupid,” Grossberg said. “I think they’ve underestimated me, and they underestimate their viewers.”
When reached for comment on this story, Fox News told NPR, “Fox News engaged an independent outside counsel to immediately investigate the concerns raised by Ms. Grossberg, which were made following a critical performance review. Her allegations in connection with the Dominion case are baseless and we will continue to vigorously defend Fox against her unmeritorious legal claims which are riddled with false allegations against the network and our employees.”
