Fox News CEO Roger Ailes in talks to leave after sexual harassment suit

Roger Ailes, the embattled chairman of Rupert Murdoch's Fox News channel, is to step down.

It has been confirmed the powerful 76-year-old executive is in talks leave the news channel he helped to launch in 1996. What remains to be settled are the terms and timing, his lawyer told a US trade newspaper.

Ailes' lawyer Susan Estrich has confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that Ailes is negotiating his exit from the network. The move comes as he fights a series of allegations of sexual harassment, including a lawsuit from former Fox News presenter Gretchen Carlson.

Ailes has been the most influential hand at Fox News since the channel launched in 1996. His current contract was not due to expire until 2018. According to reports, Ailes will receive as much as US$40 million ($53 million) as part of settling his contract.

End of an era: America's most powerful TV executive is about to step down.Credit: Catrina Genovese

Estrich told The Hollywood Reporter Ailes may remain with Fox News in a new capacity after stepping down from the chairmanship.

"Exit agreements can take all kinds of different forms, including agreements that provide for continuing roles," she said. "So there's a lot of negotiations going on."

News of the plan to remove Mr Ailes leaked to media ahead of any formal announcement, intensifying pressure on the company to clarify the situation.

Some media reports said media mogul Rupert Murdoch preferred to wait until the Republican National Convention had concluded before making a decision.

'Roger is a tough guy'

Estrich said that "a lot of people are talking to other people."

Estrich told The Hollywood Reporter Ailes' mood was "okay". "Roger is a tough guy," she said. "He's been around. Most people don't survive in this business. He's taking this in. He's responding."

The case exploded into the headlines when sacked presenter Gretchen Carlson filed suit in the New Jersey Superior Court, saying she was fired from the network in June because she "refused [Ailes'] sexual advances and complained about severe and pervasive sexual harassment."

The suit claimed the pair met to discuss the discriminatory treatment to which she was subjected, but that Ailes said they ought to have had "a sexual relationship a long time ago ... sometimes problems are easier to solve that way."

Ailes issued a statement in response to the initial lawsuit, challenging the veracity of its claims which he called both defamatory and offensive.

"It is wholly without merit and will be defended vigorously," Ailes said at the time.

Since the news broke of the lawsuit, a number of high-profile female news presenters at Fox News have backed Ailes, notably Greta Van Susteren, Kimberly Guilfoyle and Jeanine Pirro. Yet the channel's most prominent female presenter, Megyn Kelly, has not commented publicly.

New York magazine has reported that Kelly told investigators that Ailes had made unwanted sexual advances toward her when she joined the channel.

In the US media, Kelly's silence on the matter has been particularly damaging.

'Lay with the big boys'

Estrich said that Ailes denies the allegation. "I think everybody was surprised because Roger has spent the last 10 years helping Megyn Kelly become the star that she is," Estrich told The Hollywood Reporter.

Within the company, Ailes is said to have the support of Rupert Murdoch, but not to be close to any of Murdoch's children, including sons Lachlan and James, who are now executive chairman and chief executive officer, respectively, of Fox's parent company 21st Century Fox.

Media scrutiny of the case intensified after New York magazine published the accounts of six women who were interviewed for author Gabriel Sherman's 2014 biography of Ailes.

Their accounts include claims the Fox News chief, at different times over a 25-year-period, made either unwanted sexual advances or inappropriate sexual comments.

Two of the women gave New York magazine permission to publish their names; they are former Republican National Committee field adviser Kellie Boyle and former model Marsha Callahan.

Boyle's account included an incident in which she claims Ailes said to her: "You know if you want to play with the big boys, you have to lay with the big boys."