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CBS placed two top TV executives on administrative leave Monday night after an explosive report from the Los Angeles Times detailed allegations that they fostered a hostile work environment.
Peter Dunn, president of CBS Television Stations and David Friend, senior vice president of news for the stations, were placed on leave “pending the results of a third-party investigation,” CBS said in a statement. Dunn and Friend oversee CBS’s 28 local stations in major markets across the US, including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.
The LA Times report, which included with two dozen current and former CBS television station employees, said that the top bosses “cultivated a hostile work environment that included bullying female managers and blocking efforts to hire and retain black journalists.”
A former employee recalled Dunn making “racist, sexist, homophobic and discriminatory comments.” Dunn used racially charged language when he referred to Ukee Washington, a black evening anchor on CBS KWY Channel 3 Philadelphia. He often referred to Washington as “a jive guy,” and derided him as “dancing” through his newscasts in front of other employees. Dunn also called one anchor “too gay,” according to Margaret Cronan, a former news director at CBS KWY.
Other former employees accused Friend of criticizing a new anchor’s accent. Cronan said Friend cursed at her during a 2016 meeting with other executives, yelling “What are you a f-ing idiot.”
“CBS is committed to a diverse, inclusive and respectful workplace where all voices are heard, claims are investigated and appropriate action is taken where necessary,” CBS said in its statement.
Dunn and Friend’s administrative leave comes a day after the National Association of Black Journalists met with CBS officials including CBS Chief Executive George Cheeks and Marva Smalls, the company’s executive vice president and global head of inclusion, to discuss what the organization called “a massive problem among CBS owned-and-operated stations.”
In a statement, NABJ called for the firing of Dunn and Friend “in order for the company’s culture to be transformed.”
The new allegations echo issues that CBS, which prior to its late-2019 merger with Viacom, had been grappling with over the last few years. CBS’s former chairman and CEO, Leslie Moonves was fired in 2018 after being accused of sexual misconduct.
Claims of inappropriate behavior and treatment were also raised at CBS News, which ousted former “CBS This Morning” co-anchor Charlie Rose in the fall of 2017, as well as “60 Minutes” boss Jeff Fager in September 2018.
CBS Radio was also hit with a sexual harassment lawsuit last year, in which a former employee alleged “a deeply embedded sexist culture that extended from the top down.”
In August 2018, CBS hired two white shoe law firms, Covington & Burling and Debevoise & Plimpton, to investigate the claims made against Moonves, as well as other allegations about the company’s culture. A year after Moonves’ exit, the CBS board of directors said in a statement that the firms’ investigation “concluded that harassment and retaliation are not pervasive at CBS.”
CBS parent company ViacomCBS told the LA Times that Dunn, who has worked at CBS since 2002, had been spoken to by senior managers about the allegations in early 2019. A rep told the paper that “the company has not received any complaints about his conduct during the period since then.”
Friend told the paper in a statement that comments he made about staffers “were only based on performance or qualifications — not about anyone’s race or gender.”
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