NBC digital employees unionize and slam network's 'lack of transparency' following Ronan Farrow allegations
NBC News employees are calling out the network's "lack of transparency" following a series of bombshell allegations from Ronan Farrow.
NBC News Digital's editorial staff announced Wednesday it's unionizing with the NewsGuild of New York, in a mission statement calling out NBC following recent reporting in Farrow's book Catch and Kill, per The Hollywood Reporter.
Farrow in his book describes NBC halting his investigation into the sexual abuse allegations against Harvey Weinstein, which he would later publish in The New Yorker, as well as the claim that NBC received complaints about Matt Lauer years before he was fired. NBC has said Farrow's Weinstein investigation was not ready for air and that it was not aware of Lauer's alleged sexual misconduct prior to his firing in November 2017.
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"Recent weeks have highlighted serious questions as to how NBC News has handled incidents of sexual misconduct in the workplace as well as the opaque processes and procedures for reporting on and exposing powerful predators," the NBC News Digital News Union says.
The union also blasts the network for its "lack of transparency" in "repeatedly" refuting calls for an independent review "despite numerous such requests from staff." NBCUniversal previously said an internal investigation found "no evidence" that NBC leadership received complaints about Lauer before November 2017. The union also calls out NBC's "troubling trend of passing on stories which investigate the powerful."
This comes after MSNBC host Rachel Maddow also called out NBC's leadership on her show, saying that "accusations that people in positions of authority in this building may have been complicit in some way in shielding those guys from accountability" are "very, very hard to stomach." Maddow also announced that NBC would let former employees out of their nondisclosure agreements upon request, though one employee described this to The Daily Beast as a "cynical attempt to shut the story down."
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Brendan worked as a culture writer at The Week from 2018 to 2023, covering the entertainment industry, including film reviews, television recaps, awards season, the box office, major movie franchises and Hollywood gossip. He has written about film and television for outlets including Bloody Disgusting, Showbiz Cheat Sheet, Heavy and The Celebrity Cafe.
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