Laurie Luhn: Ailes Allegations, Settlement, and Active Lawsuits

Laurie Luhn is a former Fox News booking director who has alleged that Roger Ailes, the network’s founder, sexually harassed, coerced, and psychologically controlled her for more than 20 years. Her allegations against Roger Ailes describe conduct that began in the early 1990s at his consulting firm and continued through her tenure at Fox News, and they are now the basis of an active 2023 lawsuit against Fox News and former executive Bill Shine under New York’s Adult Survivors Act.¹

Who Laurie Luhn Is

Luhn first met Ailes in the summer of 1988, when she was 28 and working a low-level job at the Washington, D.C., headquarters of the George H.W. Bush presidential campaign. After the campaign she contacted Ailes at his consulting firm, Ailes Communications, and he hired her on a $500 monthly retainer to conduct “research.”²

When Fox News launched in 1996, Ailes brought Luhn to the network. She began in guest relations for Fox News Sunday and was later promoted to director of booking for all of Fox News, a role that paid up to $250,000 a year at its peak.³ Inside the network, colleagues viewed her as a “protected person” and a “friend of Roger.”²

What Luhn Says Ailes Did

According to Luhn, the abuse started at Ailes Communications in the early 1990s and continued through her time at Fox. She alleged that Ailes demanded she strip and dance for him in hotel rooms wearing black lingerie he called her “uniform,” and coerced her into performing oral sex under the guise of what he called “training.”³

She said Ailes photographed and videotaped her during sexual encounters and described the recordings as his “insurance policy” to guarantee her silence.⁴ Luhn said he called her his “whore” and “sex slave” and told her he “owned” her. She described a 2005 incident in which Ailes allegedly brought another woman into a hotel room, made Luhn get into bed with her, and took photographs.³

The control extended beyond sex, in her telling. She said Ailes told her, “I’m your only friend. I’m the only person in the world that you can trust.” By 2006, she alleged, he was pressuring her to recruit young female Fox News employees into private meetings where they could be harassed, a task she said he referred to as finding “Roger’s Angels.”²

Ailes denied the allegations. Through a spokesperson, he called them “fabrications built on half-truths and outright lies.”³ He died in May 2017.

The Executives She Says Enabled It

Luhn has accused two Fox figures of helping keep Ailes’ conduct hidden. She named Bill Shine, then Ailes’ close deputy, as the executive who arranged travel for her meetings with Ailes and recommended psychiatrists after her breakdown.⁵ After she was moved to New York in 2007, she said, Ailes required her to forward all her emails to him and Shine for review and dictated her responses.² Shine has denied knowledge of any harassment. He left Fox in May 2017 and was subpoenaed by a federal grand jury investigating the network’s handling of misconduct claims, though he was not charged.

Luhn also alleged that Fox lawyer Dianne Brandi, then executive vice president of business and legal affairs, played a role in silencing her. In late 2010 or early 2011, Luhn wrote to Brandi formally alleging 20 years of harassment by Ailes. According to New York Magazine, Brandi did not acknowledge the letter; a source told the magazine that she asked Ailes about the allegations, he denied them, and he then told her to “work out a settlement.”²

The 2007 Breakdown

In 2007, after internal rumors about her relationship with Ailes, Luhn was moved out of booking into an event planning role. She described this as the beginning of her psychological collapse. A workplace referral sent her to a psychiatrist, and describing what had happened triggered what she called a “full-fledged nervous breakdown” and hospitalization.³

She said Shine then recommended a psychiatrist in San Antonio, an experience she called a “nightmare” that led to medications causing her to hallucinate for more than a year, and that she attempted suicide by overdosing on lorazepam during this period. A high-ranking Fox source told New York Magazine that Ailes had moved Luhn into “fake jobs” in event planning to keep her “in the tent.”²

The 2011 Settlement

On June 15, 2011, Luhn signed a severance and settlement agreement with Fox News valued at $3.15 million, structured as $250,000 in annual payments over 12 years, with 30 percent withheld for taxes.⁶ New York Magazine described the nondisclosure terms as “iron-clad”: Luhn was barred from suing Fox, speaking to the press, or contacting government authorities such as the EEOC or FBI.²

Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York later investigated whether the network attempted to disguise the payment, according to a 2017 Washington Post report.⁷

How the Story Became Public

The NDA held until 2016, when former Fox host Gretchen Carlson sued Ailes for sexual harassment. That suit triggered an internal investigation by the law firm Paul, Weiss, whose lawyers interviewed at least 24 women over four days; several reported harassment, and Megyn Kelly told investigators Ailes had harassed her roughly a decade earlier.⁸ Ailes resigned on July 21, 2016, with up to $40 million in severance.⁹

Journalist Gabriel Sherman then published Luhn’s account in New York Magazine, drawn from 11 hours of interviews.¹⁰ Luhn also spoke with the Paul, Weiss investigators and later gave an on-camera interview to ABC News’ 20/20.³

Where the Litigation Stands

Showtime Lawsuit (Resolved)

Sherman’s reporting and his 2014 book, The Loudest Voice in the Room, became the basis for the Showtime miniseries The Loudest Voice, with Annabelle Wallis playing Luhn. Luhn did not participate and, in January 2019, filed a $750 million suit against Showtime, producer Blumhouse Television, and Sherman, alleging the series portrayed her as a “willing collaborator” in Ailes’ harassment of other women rather than a victim.¹¹ On June 28, 2019, her lawyer Larry Klayman filed a notice dismissing the case with prejudice, saying “the matter has been resolved to the parties’ mutual satisfaction.”¹⁰

Defamation Suit Against Fox News (Dismissed)

In April 2019, Luhn filed a $120 million defamation suit in U.S. District Court against Fox News and its CEO, Suzanne Scott, over a Los Angeles Times profile in which Scott said she “had no clue what was going on” regarding Ailes’ misconduct. Luhn argued the remarks implied she had fabricated her allegations.¹² U.S. District Judge Dabney L. Friedrich dismissed the case in November 2019, ruling that Scott’s statements were not “of and concerning” Luhn because the article did not name her. On March 2, 2021, the D.C. Circuit affirmed, finding Scott’s remarks not “reasonably capable of any defamatory meaning.”¹³

Adult Survivors Act Suit (Active)

On January 25, 2023, Luhn filed a new complaint in New York state court against Fox News, 21st Century Fox, and Bill Shine, using New York’s Adult Survivors Act, which temporarily lifted the statute of limitations on sexual assault claims.¹ The complaint alleged decades of abuse and blackmail by Ailes and described Shine as “Ailes’s hatchet man” who managed her medical care and personal life to keep her silent.¹⁴

Luhn also alleged she had been “pressured, coerced and fraudulently induced” into signing the 2011 settlement, directly challenging its enforceability. Fox News called the suit “meritless,” saying the matter “was settled years ago” and “dismissed in subsequent litigation.”⁶

In August 2023, New York State Supreme Court Justice Lyle Frank denied Fox’s motion to dismiss, ruling that the 2011 settlement was not currently enforceable because there was “some question” as to whether Luhn had signed it under duress. The case is proceeding.¹⁵

1
NPR. Ex-Staffer Sues Fox News and Former Trump Aide Over Sexual Abuse Claims
2
New York Magazine. Former Fox Booker Says Ailes Sexually Harassed Her for 20 Years
3
ABC News. Laurie Luhn Says Roger Ailes Sexually Harassed Her for 20 Years
4
New York Magazine. Former Fox Booker Says Ailes Sexually Harassed Her for 20 Years
5
The Guardian. Bill Shine Appointment Raises Questions About Fox News Scandal
6
NBC News. Fox Employee Luhn Alleges Sex Abuse by Roger Ailes
7
The Washington Post. Federal Probe of Fox News Focuses on Payments
8
Vanity Fair. Inside the Fox News Investigation
9
The Guardian. Roger Ailes Leaves Fox News
10
Variety. Laurie Luhn Drops Suit Against Showtime
11
The Hollywood Reporter. Laura Luhn Sues Showtime Over Her Portrayal in Roger Ailes Series
12
The Hollywood Reporter. Fox News Beats Laurie Luhn Defamation Lawsuit
13
FindLaw. Luhn v. Scott LLC, No. 19-7146
14
Vanity Fair. Ex-Fox News Staffer Sues Network Over Roger Ailes’s Alleged Sexual Abuse
15
The Hollywood Reporter. Laura Luhn Lawsuit Over Roger Ailes Sexual Harassment Gets Past Dismissal