Dan Rather filed a US$70 million lawsuit against CBS and his former bosses, claiming they made him a "scapegoat" for a discredited story about US President George W. Bush's military service during the Vietnam War.
The 75-year-old Rather, whose final months on the job were clouded by controversy over the story, said the actions of the defendants damaged his reputation and cost him significant financial loss.
The lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in state Supreme Court in Manhattan, claims the network intentionally botched the aftermath of the story about Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard and had Rather take the blame to "pacify" the White House.
He was removed from his job at CBS Evening News in March 2005.
Aside from CBS Corp, the suit named former CBS parent company Viacom Inc, CBS president and CEO Leslie Moonves, Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone and Andrew Heyward, former president of CBS News.
The suit sought US$20 million in compensatory damages and US$50 million in punitive damages.
"These complaints are old news and this lawsuit is without merit," CBS spokesman Dana McClintock said. Viacom had no comment.
Rather narrated a September 2004 report saying Bush had disobeyed orders and shirked some of his duties during his National Guard service and that a commander felt pressured to make Bush's record look better.
In his lawsuit, Rather maintains that the story was true, but that if any aspect of the broadcast was not accurate, he was not responsible for the errors.
The story relied on four documents, supposedly written by Bush's commander in the Texas Air National Guard, the late lieutenant colonel Jerry Killian.
Critics questioned the documents' authenticity and suggested they were forged.
A CBS review determined the story was neither fair nor accurate.
CBS fired the story's producer and asked for the resignation of three executives because it could not authenticate documents used in the story and Rather was forced out of the anchor chair he had occupied for 24 years.
Rather's lawsuit says he was forced to apologize, although "as defendants well knew, even if any aspect of the broadcast had not been accurate, which has never been established, Mr Rather was not responsible for any such errors."
By making Rather apologize publicly, "CBS intentionally caused the public and the media to attribute CBS' alleged bungling of the episode to Mr Rather," the lawsuit claimed.
As a result, some news media called the event "Rathergate."
He also claimed that after removing him as anchor of the CBS Evening News, the network gave him fewer and less important assignments and little airtime on 60 Minutes and 60 Minutes II.
At the time, Rather was making US$6 million a year, the lawsuit said.
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
CYBERSCAM: Anne, an interior decorator with mental health problems, spent a year and a half believing she was communicating with Brad Pitt and lost US$855,259 A French woman who revealed on TV how she had lost her life savings to scammers posing as Brad Pitt has faced a wave of online harassment and mockery, leading the interview to be withdrawn on Tuesday. The woman, named as Anne, told the Seven to Eight program on the TF1 channel how she had believed she was in a romantic relationship with the Hollywood star, leading her to divorce her husband and transfer 830,000 euros (US$855,259). The scammers used fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as artificial intelligence image-creating technology to send Anne selfies and other messages
RSS