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*Two women have come forward with sexual harassment accusations against veteran broadcast journalist Tom Brokaw during their time at NBC News.
In a Washington Post story published Thursday, former NBC correspondent Linda Vester and an anonymous source who claims to have been a production assistant said Brokaw made unwanted advances and acted inappropriately to them in the 1990s, when he was an anchor for “NBC Nightly News.”
Vester alleged that the then-married Brokaw once invited himself over to her hotel and said he wanted to initiate an “affair of more than passing affection.” She says he attempted to forcibly kiss her and made unwanted advances once more a year later.
The anonymous source alleged that, when she was a 24-year-old production assistant, Brokaw once pulled her into a small enclave in the NBC office, pressed her hands against his chest and asked her to come to his office after his show that night.
In a statement to The Washington Post, Brokaw acknowledged that he had met Vester on two occasions but denied any misconduct, calling the meetings “brief, cordial and appropriate.” Brokaw did not recall any incident with a production assistant.
Vester said that she was speaking out only now because NBC News had not hired an outside counsel to investigate allegations of sexual misconduct. In November, “Today” co-anchor Matt Lauer was fired over his own allegations of misconduct and replaced on Today by Hoda Kotb, who now co-anchors with Savannah Guthrie.
The Washington Post story also contains new allegations against Lauer from one woman who says he exposed himself to her in his office and requested she touch him, and another who said she and Lauer had sex in the middle of the day in his office. The accusers were not named in the story.
Additionally, former “Today” co-host Ann Curry tells The Washington Post that a female staffer came to her in 2012 with claims that she had been “sexually harassed physically” by Lauer. Curry says that she “told management they had a problem and that they needed to keep an eye on [Lauer] and how he deals with women.” An NBC spokesman told The Washington Post that it had no internal record of Curry’s alleged comment to management.
In other sexual harassment news, the New York Times investigation that brought down Harvey Weinstein will be made into a film by Brad Pitt and his production partners at plan B.
Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey were recently named Pulitzer Prize winners for their article about the movie mogul’s alleged sexual misconduct. Since the publication of the Times piece, over 80 women have come forward with allegations of sexual misconduct, rape and assault against Weinstein, who maintains he never had non-consensual sex with a woman.
The film will detail how both journalists pieced together their expose that then led to Weinstein issuing an apology and stepping down as a board member at The Weinstein Company.
Ironically, Pitt once challenged Weinstein in 1995 after his then-girlfriend Gwyneth Paltrow accused the producer of making unwanted advances.
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