Looking back now, the entire media world owes so, so much to former Fox host Gretchen Carlson, whose lawsuit against Fox CEO Roger Ailes began a deeper investigation into the nearly endless corruption hidden in plain sight.
In the latest chapter in the Ailes saga, it has been revealed that Fox News, under the direction of Ailes and Murdoch, hacked in and stole phone records for many journalists. One we know for sure is that a journalist for the publication Media Matters was an unknowing victim of this hack.
As a result of the revelation, Media Matters is considering lodging their own suit against Ailes.
Gabriel Sherman, the journalist who has been digging deep into the Ailes story long before the sexual assault allegations made front pages, revealed this new information about the depths to which Fox was willing to sink in order to dig up dirt on anyone who might threaten the Fox empire.
In an article published in New York Magazine, Sherman recounts:
“Fox News also obtained the phone records of journalists, by legally questionable means. According to two sources with direct knowledge of the incident, Brandi, Fox’s general counsel, hired a private investigator in late 2010 to obtain the personal home- and cell-phone records of Joe Strupp, a reporter for the liberal watchdog group Media Matters. (Through a spokesperson, Brandi denied this.) In the fall of that year, Strupp had written several articles quoting anonymous Fox sources, and the network wanted to determine who was talking to him. “This was the culture. Getting phone records doesn’t make anybody blink,” one Fox executive told me.”
This story will continue to unravel, and hopefully by the end of it, we can find this sexually harassing, legally questionable crook in prison for his crimes. And may he bring down corrupt Fox News with him.