Twenty-four hours after New York magazine cut ties with star journalist Olivia Nuzzi over her romantic relationship with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the correspondent is reportedly recovering from a high-velocity month of headline-making.
“She’s just catching her breath,” a person familiar with the situation told the Daily Beast.
The person familiar said Nuzzi had received multiple phone calls of shows of support—including some involving employment opportunities. The person familiar wouldn’t disclose which publications those were with, though added “old media doesn’t care” about this story and its impact, implying Nuzzi believes openings may still exist within legacy publications such as the New Yorker and well-known digital sites.
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“Olivia has been really heartened by how many people who have reached out,” the person told the Daily Beast.
It is unclear which specific publications are interested in hiring her, though it’s clear Nuzzi is interested in getting back to work sooner rather than later. In a statement on Monday, her lawyer said Nuzzi was “excited about the next chapter of her career” and claimed that both investigations found she did “nothing wrong.”
New York magazine announced unceremoniously on Monday that Nuzzi would be leaving the outlet following a third-party review of her work to determine bias in her work that may have stemmed from the affair—of which it found none. She was suspended last month after the magazine learned of her relationship with Kennedy, though it said at the time it found no evidence that relationship impacted her stories on the presidential election.
Nuzzi has largely remained mum on the professional element of her story, declining to chat about her relationship outside of the legal system. Nuzzi filed a blistering affidavit earlier this month that accused her ex-fiancé, Politico’s chief Washington correspondent Ryan Lizza, of leaking the details of the affair to the magazine; blackmailing her to force her to stay in their relationship; and threatening her with violence.
The claims go in front of a Washington, D.C. court next month. (Lizza has been on leave for weeks, though he has called her claims “disgraceful” and part of a “coordinated defamation campaign” against him.)
But she hasn’t been entirely out of the public eye. She attended an event put on by the fashion line Argent last month, posing for pictures at the event attended by House of Cards star Kate Mara, journalist Lisa Ling, and Academy Award-winning director Ava DuVernay.
Nuzzi also continued working on her AMC black-comedy show that, perhaps now ironically, will focus on a D.C. reporter breaking away from the mainstream media. A source confirmed last month that the series, co-produced with Killing Eve producer Gina Mingacci, was still in development.
There is, oddly enough, a precedent that offers a possible case study for comparison: Lizza’s own career. Lizza was accused of sexual impropriety during his time at The New Yorker, which he denied at the time (though in his case there was no alleged ethical lapse in his reporting). CNN also investigated the matter, however, and found “no reason” to keep him off the air. Lizza was eventually hired by Esquire six months later, and Politico made him their chief Washington correspondent in 2019.
There’s also the other character involved in the case: Kennedy. The story has not publicly stained his relationship with Trump, and Kennedy said last week Trump may give him an outsized role in shaping agriculture policy.
“When Donald Trump gets me inside the building I’m standing outside of right now, it won’t be this way anymore,” he said last week. “American agriculture will come roaring back, and so will American health.”
