Journalist Ronan Farrow likened former President Bill Clinton in a new profile to two of the most high-profile names brought down in the #MeToo movement against powerful men accused of sexual harassment: Harvey Weinstein and Charlie Rose.
Farrow won a Pulitzer Prize for public service this year for his extensive reporting on Weinstein and other prominent men accused of sexual harassment and abuse in their workplace. GQ profiled Farrow as a "Man of the Year" for his reporting, where he recalled first meeting Weinstein at an Aspen confab hosted by Rose, the longtime CBS journalist fired last year over sexual misconduct.
"It’s even possible maybe Bill Clinton was there," Farrow said. "A real Who’s Who on this issue."
Clinton has at times faced a modern reckoning over his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, growing angry with an NBC News reporter as he said he had publicly apologized for his conduct. He has long denied other allegations of misconduct made against him, just as Juanita Broaddrick's claim that he raped her in 1978. He was also accused of sexual harassment by Arkansas state employee Paula Jones when he was governor and White House aide Kathlen Willey when he was president.
Clinton was impeached in 1998 for obstruction and perjury related to the Lewinsky scandal. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D., N.Y.), a possible 2020 White House contender, said last year Clinton should have resigned over the affair.
Farrow worked for Bill Clinton's wife, Hillary Clinton, at the State Department from 2011 to 2012, following two years of other diplomatic work in the Obama administration. He later had a short-lived MSNBC daytime show before transitioning to investigative reporting at NBC News.
Farrow told GQ he had an initial "friendly, positive impression" of Weinstein before his reporting revealed the extent of the Hollywood mogul's wrongdoing.
He met opposition from NBC's brass and ultimately published his astonishing report in the New Yorker in October 2017. The story, coupled with reporting on Weinstein's payoffs to accusers in the New York Times, led to a flood of women accusing Weinstein of rape, abuse and intimidation over decades in Hollywood and the collapse of the Oscar-winning producer's storied career.
The Weinstein story precipitated the global #MeToo movement, which has caught up Rose—who was fired by CBS News last year after the Washington Post reported he groped and harassed multiple women during his career—and scores of other prominent men across politics, business, media and entertainment.