On Friday, political blogger and occasional Fox News guest Debbie Schlussel appeared on the Pat Campbell Podcast and announced that she had been the victim of sexual harassment at the hands of Fox News host Sean Hannity. Hours later -- after Hannity vowed to fight the accusation -- Schlussel walked back her story and admitted that no sexual harassment ever took place. During the podcast Campbell asked Schlussel if she ever witnessed any inappropriate behavior at Fox News.
"Only by Sean Hannity, not by Bill O'Reilly," she replied.
Schlussel claimed Hannity invited her to his hotel room
According to Schlussel, Hannity repeatedly invited her back to his hotel room during a book signing event in Detroit. Schlussel, who was slated to appear as a guest on Hannity's show that evening, stated, "Sean came up to me and said we’re gonna double-team -- which was a weird phrase to use -- this Palestinian guy that I was up against on the show."
Hannity, who holds strong pro-Israel views, frequently called upon Schlussel, who is Jewish, to appear on his show to argue against guests with pro-Palestinian viewpoints.
Schlussel, however, apparently mistook the term "double-team" as a double entendre with sexual connotations.
Schlussel claims that, after turning down Hannity's advances, she no longer received bookings as a guest on his show. Liberal media outlets such as The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast wasted no time in bashing Hannity over the accusations, forcing the Fox News star to come out swinging.
On Sunday evening, Hannity released a statement to TheBlaze vehemently denying the accusation, calling his accuser a "serial harasser" who has been slandering him for over a decade. He said Schlussel has a history of making "provably false arguments" against him, and, unlike Bill O'Reilly, he wasn't about to roll over and go down without a fight.
"My patience with this individual is over," Hannity declared. "I have retained a team of some of the finest and toughest lawyers in the country who are now in the process of laying out the legal course of action we will be taking against this individual."
Schlussel changes her story
Schlussel frequently skewers Sean Hannity on her blog, which probably explains why the Fox News host hasn't invited her back as a guest on his show. In 2010, she accused Hannity of bilking a charity for wounded veterans. The Freedom Alliance, the organization referred to by Schlussel in her blog post, issued a detailed expense sheet the following day disproving the blogger's allegations.
On Monday, Debbie Schlussel told Rachel Stockman of LawNewz that she never intended to give the impression that she had been a victim of sexual harassment.
“I would never accuse him of that," she insisted.
She then clarified the remarks she had made earlier on the Pat Campbell Podcast, claiming that Sean Hannity didn't actually invite her to his room, but to the hotel where he was staying so that they could discuss the blogger's Fox News appearance later that evening.
“I never thought I was sexually harassed by Sean Hannity, I thought he was weird and creepy, not someone I liked,” Schlussel added.
Schlussel is the latest person to come forward with claims of inappropriate behavior at Fox News. After Bill O'Reilly was fired from the network amid a sexual harassment scandal, black employees claimed that they had been treated unfairly by the company.
Over the weekend, New York Magazine reported that seven black employees are expected to join an existing racial discrimination lawsuit against Fox News. The black employees allege that they were forced by the company's accounting department to participate in arm wrestling matches against white employees.
In 2016, former Fox News host Megyn Kelly wrote about being the victim of sexual harassment at the hands of then-CEO Roger Ailes in her autobiography "Settle For More." Ailes was later ousted from his position because of the allegations.