Chris Matthews called harassment allegations against him “highly credible” in his first interview since leaving MSNBC and his show Hardball.
The former host told Vanity Fair in an interview published Friday that he did not want to push back on or try to downplay the allegations leveled against him by former colleagues and network guests, who claimed he made inappropriate and demeaning remarks to them.
Recommended Stories
He said he found the accusations credible and agreed that it was wrong to have said, “Keep putting makeup on her, I’ll fall in love with her,” while frequent guest Laura Bassett was preparing to go on air years ago.
“I didn’t argue about it, I didn’t deny it,” Matthews said. “I accepted the credibility of the complaint in the article. I didn’t want to challenge the person that made the complaint and wrote the article. I thought it was very credible and certainly within the person’s rights to write that article, of course. That was highly justified. Basically, as I said, to repeat myself, it’s inappropriate in the workplace to compliment somebody on their appearance, this is in the makeup chair, and I did it.”
His retirement announcement quickly followed Bassett’s decision to come forward with her accusations against the longtime host. On his last show, Matthews said, “Compliments on a woman’s appearance that some men, including me, might have once incorrectly thought were OK, were never OK. Not then and certainly not today, and, for making such comments in the past, I’m sorry.”
His departure from the network shocked many, including several of his fellow hosts. Morning Joe host Mika Brzezinski questioned the #MeToo movement after Matthews announced his retirement.
“As a woman, I just, I want to say this: I loved working with Chris Matthews. I really enjoyed being his colleague,” she said. “And I really, I understand the important changes around this so-called cancel culture. They’re important. They’re hard. They’re painful. And in many cases, they are necessary. I do wonder, at this point, though, as we move forward and we look at this and what happened here, if there might be a better way for all of us in the future where we work through this and get to a better place.”
