Former NBC News Anchor Linda Vester Says 'Everyone Knew' About Matt Lauer's Sexual Harassment Of Women
Whoo, chile, the reckoning!
Instagram The messiness surrounding Matt Lauer continues, and now, it's just been revealed that there were more than a few people who knew about what was going on at the Peacock Network. That is, of course, if you believe Tom Brokaw's accuser, and frankly, she has no reason to lie. So who is Linda Vester, and did everyone at NBC really know about the harassment going on?
Linda Vester is a name that, while it doesn't ring bells like a more high profile female news anchor (like Norah O'Donnell or Katie Couric), should still be familiar to you. As a respected journalist, Vester was the host of NBC News at Sunrise and Dayside with Linda Vester on the Fox News Channel. In 2005, she left the television news world to focus on raising her children. Today, she's known for her philanthropy work and her work on a website for moms.
Let's look at what Linda Vester knows, and says, about this whole NBC situation.
1. She was Tom Brokaw's accuser.
According to Vanity Fair, Linda Vester was one of two former NBC employees who accused Tom Brokaw of sexual harassment. Vester's story is that Tom Brokaw tried to kiss her on a few separate occasions while she worked there in the 1990s. She also claimed that Brokaw would frequently tickle her, as well. (For his part, Tom Brokaw categorically denied the allegations.)
2. Linda Vester penned an open letter for The Daily Beast backing up Matt Lauer's accuser, Brooke Nevils.
When Brooke Nevils went public with Matt Lauer's attack on her back at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, Linda Vester backed up her former colleague by penning an open letter to The Daily Beast in which she promised to deliver "some radical truth-telling." In her blistering account of her time at NBC, Vester raked Lauer over the proverbial coals. "Matt may pretend with this bizarre letter that all he desires is to “set the record straight,” but those of us who have survived sexual harassment and assault know better. I believe his words are intended to harm and silence women. They are the rantings of a self-absorbed coward who has yet to take true responsibility for what he has done," she said in the letter. Oh snap!
3. She also backed up Ronan Farrow's account of events in Catch & Kill.
In an interview with Fox News (via Yahoo), Linda Vester confirmed the allegations in Ronan Farrow's new book, Catch and Kill, and said that NBC knew about the problems that were going on but refused to do anything about it. "Ronan is reporting, among other things, that NBC apparently did know that Matt was a problem. And let me tell you, from having worked at NBC News for nearly a decade, everybody knew. We all knew Matt was dangerous. He had to be avoided at all costs. So for NBC executives to say they didn’t know — I have a hard time with that," she said.
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4. But Linda Vester also admitted that she didn't personally witness any of Matt Lauer's predatory behavior.
In the same interview with Fox News (via Yahoo), Linda Vester admitted that she, personally, didn't witness any of Matt Lauer's predatory behavior. However, she said that even though she, personally, didn't witness Matt's bad behavior, that doesn't mean it didn't happen. She also said that people who have had positive relationships with Matt Lauer shouldn't take that as the be-all and end-all, either, because "predators hide their behavior. They hide it a lot."
5. Mika Brzezinski publicly supported Tom Brokaw but privately apologized to Linda Vester.
To give everyone an idea of how badly a male-dominated newsroom can mess with your mind if you're a woman, Fox News reported that Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski publicly supported Tom Brokaw against the sexual harassment claims made by Linda Vester. However, later on, Brzezinski privately apologized to Vester for doing so. She then attacked Vester when Vester went public with Mika's apology and showed screenshots of the text as proof.
6. Something definitely happened — and we may never find out what.
"Lauer, Brokaw, and pretty much every other man accused of any impropriety in Ronan Farrow’s new book Catch and Kill deny the allegations. On Monday, NBC News President Noah Oppenheim released an angry letter insisting that the network has “no secrets and nothing to hide,” which is generally what men say right before we find out they did something horrible," reported Jezebel, which really sums up this whole awful situation.
Bernadette Giacomazzo is an editor, writer, and photographer whose work has appeared in People, Teen Vogue, Us Weekly, The Source, XXL, HipHopDX, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Post, and more. She is also the author of The Uprising series. For more information about Bernadette Giacomazzo, click here.