Right-wing legal eagle and Donald Trump supporter Larry Klayman, who played a key role in pushing Bill Clinton’s impeachment back in the 1990s, is warning President Trump not to hire former Fox News executive Bill Shine.
Shine, who was forced out of Fox News more than a year ago amid allegations that he helped facilitate and cover up the late Roger Ailes’ sexual misconduct with female underlings, is reportedly under serious consideration to be named White House communications director and a deputy chief of staff.
On Tuesday, Klayman called on federal and local prosecutors in New York to investigate Shine for potential crimes related to his role at Fox News; Shine was a key person of interest in an earlier federal investigation into the alleged misuse of corporate funds to pay off and hush up Ailes’s accusers.
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Klayman, a conservative activist who founded Judicial Watch—which gave Clinton fits with multiple lawsuits—and now heads Freedom Watch, warned Tuesday that the Trump White House will inevitably face media and political blowback if Shine is given the high-profile post.
“Mr. Shine has been alleged to have been involved in some way in at least three lawsuits involving sexual harassment of women at Fox News,” Klayman told The Daily Beast. “The president does not need unnecessary controversy as this time by naming Shine to as what is in effect a deputy of chief of staff in charge of communications and messaging, as he seeks to appoint a Supreme Court Justice, denuclearize the Korean Peninsula, deal with Iranian terrorism and its similar nuclear threat, curb illegal immigration, negotiate good trade deals and a host of other pressing and crucial issues.”
Klayman urged Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance and the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Trump administration appointee Geoffrey Berman, to review what he called “serious and published allegations about Shine, including his activities involving Laurie Luhn, a former Fox News employee who has alleged she was sexually abused by former Fox CEO Roger Ailes.”
Klayman added: “Luhn claims allegedly that she was videotaped in sex acts by Ailes and that he ‘coerced her into performing sex acts on him.’”
“It is truly bizarre that a Fox News executive—or an executive at any company—would be alleged to exercise control over an employee suffering mental illness,” Klayman said. “There is a now a serious question, as alleged and must now be thoroughly investigated before Shine ascends to the White House, if Fox and Shine engaged in involuntary captivity of Luhn while she was in need of medical assistance.”
Klayman continued: “President Trump is not anti-women's rights, but he has been unfairly branded as such by the leftist media in a further attempt to harm his presidency and to try to drive him from office. Before he hires Shine, he should first allow for a full investigation into Shine's alleged abuse of Ms. Luhn and cover-up which, if true, could amount to obstruction of justice.”
Klayman, who clashed with the famously vindictive Fox News founder Ailes over the handling of female clients who happened to be Clinton accusers, told The Daily Beast on Tuesday: “I had issues with Ailes. Shine and Ailes were joined at the hip.”
“I don’t want to see the ghost of Roger Ailes running the White House communications operation.”
