Richard Levick | November 7th, 2016

Fox bets on Megyn Kelly as the Future

Her Allegations against Roger Ailes are important but they are more a Profile in Marketing than Courage

Last week, I sat down to tape an interview with CNN to talk about Megyn Kelly™’s accusation that she, too, was sexually harassed by ousted Fox News CEO Roger Ailes. This shouldn’t really be a surprise for anyone. Let™’s not forget why Roger Ailes is no longer at the network. It™’s because Gretchen Carlson detailed wide-ranging and systemic harassment by him. When you have a culture of harassment at the top like that, it™’s a tragic no brainer that Fox™’s golden child would have experienced it too.

Kelly™’s star has been on the rise at Fox News, and for good reason. Megyn Kelly has broad appeal to Fox News’ core audiences and, even more importantly, to viewers who are outside of that core. Even more liberal viewers will watch – and admit to liking – Megyn Kelly when they are turned off by everyone and everything else on the network. As Fox looks to rebuild from the Ailes years, she is going to be a big part of Fox News programming and their reach across the aisle. She represents a bridge to credibility that will filter down to the rest of Fox™’s programming.

However, it is slightly suspect that she comes forward with this now – slightly more than a week before her book is slated to be released. That makes it hard to give her a real profile in courage award (that goes to Gretchen Carlson). With Ailes’ ship completely sunk and no chance of his return to the network, this is instead a great profile in marketing as she is clearly going to sell a lot more books because of this latest bombshell. 

We’ll all be staying tuned to see how this shakes out after the dust settles.