Fox Tells Media Matters to Stop Airing Tucker Footage

Fox Corp., parent company of Fox News, sent a letter to Media Matters for America on Friday, telling the liberal media watchdog to stop airing leaked video footage of former Fox host Tucker Carlson making inappropriate comments, The Hill reported.

“We write on behalf of Fox Corporation to clarify any misunderstandings Media Matters may have had regarding previously unaired footage that Media Matters has published in a series of articles headlined ‘FOXLEAKS,'” attorneys for the network reportedly wrote. “That unaired footage is Fox’s confidential intellectual property; Fox did not consent to its distribution or publication; and Fox does not consent to its further distribution or publication.”

The videos were given to Media Matters “without Fox’s authorization,” said the network’s lawyers, who demanded the watchdog group “cease and desist from distribution, publication, and misuse of Fox’s misappropriated proprietary footage, which you are now on notice was unlawfully obtained.”

Media Matters published videos over the past several days showing Carlson, who was ousted by Fox, making offensive comments about women and criticizing the network on the set of his popular primetime show.

According to The Hill, Carlson called a woman “yummy” in one video; in another he asked a female makeup artist if women have “pillow fights.”

Former Fox News host Megyn Kelly on Tuesday said that the onslaught of leaks is a “destruction campaign” against Carlson coordinated by Fox News.

“The orchestrated campaign to absolutely ruin Tucker Carlson continues,” she said on her “Megyn Kelly Show” podcast. “It wasn’t enough to fire their number one star, in my opinion. Fox News seems absolutely determined to ruin him – to ruin his reputation, to make him unemployable and, ideally, in their view, to make his audience turn on him so that they won’t follow him wherever he goes next.”

Pointing the finger at Irena Briganti, Fox’s vice president of communications, last week, Kelly said: “And I know it’s Irena Briganti, who runs coms and f*****g hates Tucker. … Sorry, she hates his guts, and it’s mutual. He doesn’t like her, either. None of us do. Nobody likes Irena.”

According to a 2016 New York magazine report, Fox anchors and producers “live in fear of crossing Briganti, who is known for leaking damaging personal stories about Fox employees to journalists.”

In an email, Briganti called Kelly’s allegations “completely false and an outright lie.”