Fox Nation host Britt McHenry files sexual harassment suit against Fox News and her former co-host

Britt McHenry, host of Un-PC on streaming service Fox Nation, has filed a lawsuit against Fox News and former co-host George Murdoch claiming that she was subject to sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and retaliation at the network.

McHenry, a Burlington County native, filed the suit in the Southern District of New York on Tuesday for unspecified monetary damages. She alleges that Murdoch, who is a former WWE wrestler known as Tyrus, began sexually harassing her after the pair began working together on Un-PC last year. Murdoch began hosting his own show, Nuff Said, on Fox Nation after McHenry filed official complaints with Fox News management and the New York State Division of Human Rights earlier this year.

“After payouts of over $100 million in recent sexual harassment scandals, Fox News publicly says it now has ‘zero tolerance’ for sexual harassment,” the suit reads. “This is a dangerous lie. In practice, Fox News remains a sanctuary for sexual harassers, coddling and enabling the men who abuse female employees.”

According to the suit, Murdoch had “volatile and unpredictable behavior” as McHenry’s co-host, and began sending McHenry lewd text messages in October 2018, in addition to sexually harassing her in person. The complaint details a number of sexually explicit messages allegedly from Murdoch, including at least two in which the sender threatened to send McHenry pictures of their genitals. McHenry, the suit says, “never crossed the line or sent Mr. Murdoch any sexual messages.”

McHenry says in the suit that Fox News found no evidence of sexual harassment in their investigations of her complaints about Murdoch’s alleged behavior. Investigators instead said McHenry did not disclose two text messages she allegedly sent Murdoch with pictures depicting her cleavage, which she calls “fraudulent” in the suit.

“A simple Google Image search shows that the first image was taken from a website and the woman depicted was not Ms. McHenry,” the suit says.

Following her complaints, McHenry claims, the network retaliated against her by offering little promotion of Un-PC, as well as few other professional opportunities. Fox News, meanwhile, denied McHenry’s claims in a statement to the Associated Press, saying that the allegations “have been fully investigated and we are confident our actions will be deemed entirely appropriate in litigation.”

“We expect all of her claims to be dismissed,” the network added.

Murdoch has also denied the allegations publicly via a message on his Twitter account attributed to his attorney, Tom Clare.

“Tyrus denies the allegations in the lawsuit and will be defending it vigorously,” Clare’s statement read. “He looks forward to having a public forum in the court system to clear his name from the smear campaign that has been waged against him in the media. Tyrus will be pursuing defamation counterclaims.”

McHenry also issued a public statement on Twitter, writing that she was “standing up for myself, for women and for what’s right.”

“I have maintained the same allegations because the truth doesn’t change. I feel for any sexual harassment victim who has their story and evidence dismissed, doubted and not believed,” she wrote. “There is documentation to prove everything I have claimed. I look forward to my day in court.”

McHenry has had her own brushes with controversy over the years, including a belittling tirade against a parking garage cashier that earned her a suspension by ESPN. Known for making increasingly heated takes on Twitter as she transitioned from a sports personality to a conservative political pundit, McHenry was widely lambasted last year for criticizing former Eagles defender Chris Long over his decision to donate his base salary to charity, something she later apologized for.