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| Andrea Tantaros |
Fox News’ “The Five” host Andrea Tantaros has sued Talk
Radio Network, the home of her radio talk show, accusing the company of fraud
and breaching its contract with the conservative media star, leaving her with a
nearly staff-less show that could only book “‘C-list’ quality guests.”
Tantaros also sent a letter to TRN terminating her
employment agreement on Wednesday, the suit said.
“This is a situation entirely of TRN’s own making,”
Tantaros’ lawyer, Joseph Cane, told TheWrap.
“TRN’s dire financial troubles have unfortunately affected its ability to uphold multiple contact responsibilities to Ms. Tantaros. Andrea loves doing radio, values her affiliates and has fulfilled the duties of her contract for the past two months while TRN has kept her in the dark, fired her staff, and the staff at TRN necessary to sell the show to advertisers.”
“TRN’s dire financial troubles have unfortunately affected its ability to uphold multiple contact responsibilities to Ms. Tantaros. Andrea loves doing radio, values her affiliates and has fulfilled the duties of her contract for the past two months while TRN has kept her in the dark, fired her staff, and the staff at TRN necessary to sell the show to advertisers.”
In the suit, Tantaros said that TRN’s president and CEO Mark
Masters made several false statements to recruit her for a radio show,
including that Laura Ingraham, whose show Tantaros replaced, “was a nightmare,
difficult to deal with, and an impossible and unfair negotiator and that is why
Defendant TRN was planning to part ways with Ms. Ingraham and why her coveted
time slot would be available.”
TRN also promised to invest millions of dollars into
promoting Tantaros’ new show to the approximately 300 local stations with which
it had syndication deals. Tantaros’ decision to enter into a contract with TRN
was based on those statements; as her salary was determined by a combination of
a fixed rate ($300,000) and a percentage of revenue, TRN’s ability to earn that
revenue was important.
“TRN induced Andrea into the contract based on a set of
material misrepresentations of fact,” Cane said.
Making matters worse, the suit says, TRN “laid off most of
its staff and many others simultaneously ‘resigned’ from their positions,
including, and critically, most of Defendant TRN’s sales team.” Some of those
staffers worked on Tantaros’ show and were replaced by members of Mark Masters’
family.
TRN’s “implosion,” the suit said, has caused Tantaros’ own
brand and reputation to suffer. Her Fox News employer has “repeatedly expressed
its concern at the implosion of Defendant TRN.”
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