michael barbaro

From The New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro.

archived recording 1 Explosive new allegations tonight from The New York Times about Harvey Weinstein, the studio exec known for producing blockbuster — archived recording 2 Producer Harvey Weinstein is responding tonight after The New York Times revealed decades of sexual harassment claims against him. archived recording 3 This morning, two more women have come forward accusing media — archived recording Harvey Weinstein ousted from his own company over sexual harassment —

[distorted voices]

megan twohey

So before all that, in the summer of 2017, weeks into my joining Jodi on the Harvey Weinstein investigation, we were stuck.

michael barbaro

Today on “The Daily,” my colleagues Megan Twohey and Jodi Kantor.

megan twohey

Like so many other reporters who had tried and failed to report on Weinstein, we were hitting roadblock after roadblock. People wouldn’t return our calls. We couldn’t find any records or documents. There were so many hints and indications that there was a story there, but we were just really having a hard time figuring out how to crack it open. It really seemed like Harvey Weinstein had just been a master in covering his tracks. So in the midst of all of these challenges and frustrations, I decide that I’m going to call Gloria Allred.

archived recording (gloria allred) We don’t think that our daughter should have to trade sexual favors in order to get a raise.

megan twohey

Gloria Allred —

archived recording (gloria allred) Sir, I frankly feel that I have a moral duty to speak out, that I should —

megan twohey

— calls herself the most famous woman attorney practicing law.

archived recording (gloria allred) And I think that action, if it were not by a celebrity, would be condemned, would be criticized, and would be investigated.

megan twohey

And she is famous.

archived recording 1 Supporters call her a feminist avenger. archived recording 2 She was my advocate. archived recording (gloria allred) I feel that it’s my commitment, my total commitment to making social change.

megan twohey

She’s probably the most visible victims’ rights advocate in the country.

archived recording Now enters Gloria Allred, who says that they are entitled to equal services and privilege.

megan twohey

She has been at the forefront of fighting for women’s issue after women’s issue —

archived recording (gloria allred) Women’s contributions have not been commemorated on Memorial Day.

megan twohey

— for decades —

archived recording (gloria allred) This case is a class action on behalf of all females.

megan twohey

— you know, whether it’s abortion rights or child support rights.

archived recording She sued a department store for charging women more for alterations than men.

megan twohey

And by far her most visible work —

archived recording (gloria allred) Thank you for coming today. I’m attorney Gloria Allred.

megan twohey

— has been fighting on behalf of women who have been victims of sexual harassment and sexual assault by powerful men.

archived recording (gloria allred) Tomorrow Bill Cosby will perform his “Far From Finished” tour in Atlanta, Georgia. He is performing despite the fact that more than 40 women have publicly accused him of drugging and sexually assaulting them.

megan twohey

Now, you name it. Like, you name a case with a high-profile man alleged of sexual harassment or sexual assault —

archived recording There was no one else to contact. She understands. She’s experienced. She does it every day in her work.

megan twohey

— you can almost guarantee that Gloria Allred was part of that.

archived recording (gloria allred) Justice is long overdue for these brave women, and they will be silent no more.

megan twohey

So I reached out to her thinking this is somebody who knows this landscape and may be able to help me figure it out. But when we finally connected by phone, the call was actually pretty brief and actually pretty disappointing. You know, to be fair, I didn’t actually provide her with a lot of information to help inform the phone call. You know, I didn’t tell her one of the key things, which was that it was Harvey Weinstein we were investigating, and that’s because of this email that Jodi had just gotten.

jodi kantor

So just a few weeks before Megan and Gloria spoke on the phone, I was on a flight to L.A. I was trying to get more people to talk to me about Weinstein. It was pretty tough going. I was riding solo on the story at that point, and I’m spending a lot of days just calling people and not getting any answers. So many people were just afraid to speak. And so I’m sitting there on the flight. I’m on the Wi-Fi, and lo and behold, this email lands, and it’s from Lisa Bloom. And she says, “I’d like to speak with you briefly about a story you’re working on. Do you have time for a phone call?”

archived recording (lisa bloom) Too often we are still second-class citizens.

jodi kantor

And I got really excited, because —

archived recording (lisa bloom) I do women’s rights cases. I see this every day.

jodi kantor

— Lisa Bloom is Gloria Allred’s daughter.

archived recording (lisa bloom) And to all of the victims I’ve represented in high-profile cases, they stand taller afterwards. They feel very good about speaking their truth.

jodi kantor

And she was second only to Gloria in her reputation as a fighter for women.

archived recording (lisa bloom) So if you are victimized, if you are treated differently, I hope you will stand up for your rights.

jodi kantor

That summer, the two of them would be profiled in W magazine together. There’s this beautiful picture of them together, looking strong. And the headline says, “Gloria Allred and Lisa Bloom Are the Defenders of Women in 2017.”

archived recording (lisa bloom) We will find you, come after you, and bring you to justice to the fullest extent possible. You have been warned.

michael barbaro

So what are you thinking at this point?

jodi kantor

I thought, this is amazing. She knows about Weinstein victims, and she’s calling to help. So I wrote back, and I said, “I’m actually on my way to L.A. right now. Can I stop by your office tomorrow?” And then I forwarded the email to our colleague Emily Steel, because Emily had broken open the Bill O’Reilly story, and I knew that Lisa Bloom had represented one of the alleged victims. So within minutes, an email comes back from Emily, and she says, “Stop. I have to call you.” So what Emily told me once I landed was that Lisa Bloom had tweeted very excitedly a few months before: Harvey Weinstein and Jay-Z are making a movie out of my book, “Suspicion Nation.” Lisa Bloom was actually in business with Harvey Weinstein. So once Emily said that, I knew that Lisa Bloom wasn’t contacting me to help with the story.

michael barbaro

Instead?

jodi kantor

She was working with Harvey Weinstein.

[music]

michael barbaro

So Megan, this is why, despite hoping that Gloria would be a good lead, you were hesitant to tell her what you were working on. I mean, her daughter was working with the subject of your investigation.

megan twohey

Exactly. So this was just the beginning of a realization. We had, at first, thought that these two attorneys, this mother and daughter, would be keys that could help us unlock the Weinstein story, but over time we would learn that, in their own separate ways, they actually helped keep it secret.

michael barbaro

Last week, Megan and Jodi published a book, “She Said,” documenting their investigation of Harvey Weinstein. In writing it, they discovered new information about two feminist icons that raises questions about their legacies and about the legal system in which they work. Today, Part 1: Lisa Bloom. It’s Wednesday, September 18. So what do we now know about the role of Lisa Bloom in the Harvey Weinstein story?

megan twohey

Well, what we’ve now realized is that the moment that Lisa Bloom called Jodi Kantor in the summer of 2017, she had already been working with Harvey Weinstein for months. She had crossed over to the other side at a rate of $895 an hour to help this powerful producer seek to evade scrutiny and conceal his alleged predatory behavior.

michael barbaro

And how do you know that?

megan twohey

Well, we know that because after we published that first Weinstein story, we kept reporting. And we have since obtained these confidential records that spell out all of the various things that Lisa Bloom did, in fact, do for Weinstein. There were the billing records in which she gives an hour-by-hour accounting of the various things that she did on his behalf. We also obtained this document which, looking back now, really was a blueprint for the various tactics that she was going to use to try to keep everything hidden.

michael barbaro

And tell us about that document.

jodi kantor

That document is basically Lisa Bloom’s job audition memo for what she was willing to do for Harvey Weinstein. It appears that he wanted a powerful woman by his side, one with a very public reputation for protecting victims.

michael barbaro

Which is what Lisa Bloom has.

jodi kantor

Exactly. Can I just read it to you?

michael barbaro

Yeah.

jodi kantor

O.K. I’ll read some, and then I’m going to pass it over to Megan because it’s really long. This is from December 2016, and she writes a long email to Weinstein proposing how she’s essentially going to beat back allegations by Rose McGowan, the actress, against Weinstein. Now, at that point, McGowan had tweeted that a producer had raped her, and people thought it was Weinstein, but Rose hadn’t named him yet. But Weinstein clearly felt very threatened by this, and they’d had some sort of conversation. And then what Lisa Bloom does is she writes what’s essentially a road map for Harvey Weinstein of how she is going to manipulate and smear in order to discredit Rose McGowan. “Harvey, it was a treat to speak to you today, though, yes, we’d all prefer better circumstances. I’ve spent the rest of the day reading Jack and Sara’s thorough reports about Rose” — by the way, those are private investigators — “who truly comes across as a disturbed pathological liar, and also your former assistant, who seems to be less of a concern. I also read through a lot of Rose’s Twitter feed to get a sense of her and watched her short film ‘Dawn.’ I’m no film critic, but I found it dreadful, but telling as to who Rose is. Boy meets girl. Girl trusts boy. Boy murders girl. All men suck. The end. I feel equipped to help you against the Roses of the world, because I have represented so many of them. They start out as impressive, bold women, but the more one presses for evidence, the weaknesses and lies are revealed. She doesn’t seem to have much going on these days except her rapidly escalating identity as a feminist warrior, which seems to be entirely based on her online rants. For her to keep her Rose army following, she must continue ramping up the outrageousness of her diatribes. Clearly she must be stopped in her ridiculous defamatory attacks on you. She’s dangerous. You’re right to be concerned. Options after my initial read, which I can flesh out on our next call.”

megan twohey

“Number one, initiating friendly contact with her through me or other good intermediary, and after establishing a relationship, work out a win-win. Key question — what does she want? To direct, it appears? Number two, counter ops, online campaign to push back and call her out as a pathological liar. A few well-placed articles now will go a long way if things blow up for us down the line. We can place an article re: her becoming increasingly unglued, so that when someone Googles her, this is what pops up and she is discredited. We have all the facts based on publicly available information. This can begin simultaneous with number one. Number three, cease-and-desist letter from me warning her of the violation of agreement with you. Risk she poses the letter online, generating heat and backlash. Sara — ” she’s CCing Sara, the private investigator — “I need to see the agreement, please.” She’s talking about a settlement that Harvey Weinstein paid to Rose McGowan in the ‘90s following the alleged rape. So she’s talking about strategies to keep the payment that he made to her secret. “Number four, you and I come out publicly in a preemptive interview where you talk about evolving on women’s issues prompted by death of your mother and maybe nasty, unfounded, hurtful rumors about you. This will be headline-grabbing if you express genuine contrition for anyone who you hurt, while emphasizing it was always adult consensual behavior. You thought that was enough at the time, but now realize it’s more nuanced, that a power imbalance means something, et cetera. You reached out to me to help understand rapidly evolving social mores around sexual misconduct because you are a good and decent person, as evidenced by your life’s work making films on important social issues and extremely generous philanthropy. Example: Charlie Sheen. As women were set to come out against him re: H.I.V. status, he did a ‘Today’ show interview recently where he came out with it himself, receiving massive praise. I represented a few of the women, and their stories were largely drowned out by his interview and the love he got for it. It is so key from a reputation management standpoint to be the first to tell the story. I strongly recommend this. If you agree, I’d like to come out and meet with you to go over the story in some detail so this is done for maximum effectiveness. You should be the hero of the story, not the villain. This is very doable.”

jodi kantor

“Number five, start the Weinstein Foundation focusing on gender equality in film, or establish the Weinstein standards, which seek to have one-third of films directed by women or written by women or passing the Bechdel test — two named female characters talk to each other about something besides a man, whatever. Announce you will immediately raise standards, reach gender parity in very specific ways on all films under your control. Announce partnership with Geena Davis’s group that works for gender equality in film — for example, by mandating that half of all extras in crowd scenes will be female. You get the idea. These details can be worked out, but the point is you decide to be a leader and raise the bar in a concrete, headline-grabbing way. Number six, positive reputation management. I Googled your name, and a few obnoxious articles pop up. I work with a leading reputation management company that can back link to the positive articles, which prevents negative pieces from ranking well on Google. Your first page of Google is key, as 95 percent never go beyond the first Google page. Let’s improve this. Easy to do. This should happen simultaneously with other option.”

megan twohey

And then she ends, “A reminder. Would you please connect me with David Boies so that I can get retained?” David Boies is one of the attorneys who has worked most closely with Weinstein, going back 15 years, as he’s worked to conceal the allegations against him. “Also, given that your emails with the Clinton campaign were hacked recently, I recommend you set up a secure new email account for emails with this team. We shouldn’t be emailing on these sensitive matters to your company email, as your I.T. people may have access. Thanks, and really honored to be brought into this team. Talk tomorrow. Best, Lisa Bloom.”

michael barbaro

Wow.

[music]

michael barbaro

We’ll be right back. So what do you make of this memo?

jodi kantor

She’s saying, I’m going to use my experience representing vulnerable women to help you instead.

michael barbaro

To intimidate vulnerable women.

jodi kantor

Exactly.

megan twohey

I think she’s saying, I’m going to take all of my experience working on the behalf of victims and use that on your behalf to work against them.

jodi kantor

I also — you know, I’m going to ask this as a question, because we don’t have Lisa Bloom here, and I don’t know the answer. But I think it raises questions about her work generally, beyond Rose McGowan. Because it’s this line: “They start out as impressive, bold women, but the more one presses for evidence, the weaknesses and lies are revealed.” What does that mean? Does that mean that she hasn’t believed her clients over the years?

michael barbaro

And what about the billing records that you found? What do those show?

jodi kantor

Well, I’m looking right now through her billing records, and it’s just this sort of day-by-day, hour-by-hour accounting of what she did for Harvey Weinstein, her team, as well. That’s what lawyers do. They send these really detailed bills. So let’s just take a couple of examples. These records say things like “4/30/17, phone call re: reputation management issue,” which, actually, is one of the phrases that was just used in that memo and really suggests that she’s following up on the things that she promised to do.

michael barbaro

She’s managing Harvey Weinstein’s reputation.

jodi kantor

Exactly. “6/28/17, review investigator research on R.M.” So “R.M.” is Rose McGowan.

michael barbaro

So they’re digging around Rose McGowan.

jodi kantor

That’s what it sounds like. And then my own name is in there. “Meeting with Harvey. Reach out to Jodi Kantor. Research Jodi Kantor. Two hours.” So it turns out that before she called me, she was doing all this research on me.

michael barbaro

So prepping for a conversation with you at — I think you said the rate was $895. It’s a $1,600 job.

jodi kantor

She’d already been paid a $50,000 retainer, and then she was paid $895 after that.

michael barbaro

Wow.

jodi kantor

“7/12” — this is important. “Prepare for meeting with Anna. Call with Harvey. Follow up with Ronan.” So Anna is a fake name for a paid Israeli private spy who Weinstein is employing at this point to try to dupe reporters and sources and get information from them.

michael barbaro

Wow.

jodi kantor

And remember that this is all in her own hand. These are her billing records, so it looks like she was very deeply involved. “Follow up with Ronan.” That, of course, is Ronan Farrow.

michael barbaro

Of The New Yorker magazine.

jodi kantor

Yes, exactly, who was working on a very similar investigation to ours at the same time. “Review Rose P.I. reports.” “P.I.,” private investigator. Let’s see, what else? “9/7, email. Emails re: N.B.C., Ronan’s conflict. Research journalist ethics.” So that looks like they’re preparing to go to war against Ronan Farrow. And by the way, I’m reading a fraction of the entries on this document to you. It’s very long.

megan twohey

And a lot of what she’s describing in these billing records was invisible to us in the beginning of our investigation. We had no idea of what actual work she was doing for him. But as the billing records reach their completion, we are able to see activity that was, in fact, visible to us in the final stretch as Lisa Bloom flew to New York to be by Weinstein’s side in the final days as he was working to beat back our investigation. She bills him for this pretty remarkable meeting that we had at The New York Times. There was a moment as we were working to get to the finish line where Harvey Weinstein basically barged into The New York Times with Lisa Bloom and a couple other lawyers by his side demanding an off-the-record meeting. And Lisa Bloom had in her hands folders that included pictures of Rose McGowan and Ashley Judd in friendly poses with Weinstein in an effort to undermine and smear the accusers.

michael barbaro

So basically, you can see the reality that more and more of our time is going towards trying to stop the publication of your investigation, that that’s really becoming the bulk of her work.

megan twohey

Exactly.

[music]

megan twohey

And then after all those months, all those efforts, she finally faces the music and recognizes that this story is going to run, and there’s nothing that her client can do to stop it. And it appears to have been 11:38 p.m. the night before our story ran. She sends an email to Weinstein and some of his other attorneys acknowledging that they had not succeeded in killing the Times story and basically advising that, at this point, her new pitch is that Weinstein should acknowledge that he had engaged in sexual harassment, express remorse, and promise to do better. And then the second part of her pitch is that she will come in with a statement, and that she will actually testify on his behalf. She is pitching a statement in which she says, “As a woman’s rights advocate, I have been blunt with Harvey, and he has listened to me. I have told him that times have changed. It is 2017, and he needs to evolve to a higher standard. I found Harvey to be refreshingly candid and receptive to my message. He has acknowledged mistakes he has made, and as we work together on a project bringing my book to the screen, he has always been respectful towards me.” And the next day, in the hour before we published our story, Lisa Bloom sent us basically that statement.

jodi kantor

But now that I look at it again after all this time, part of what’s interesting is the link between this and that very first audition memo she laid out for Weinstein. Like, she’s trying to describe him trying to become a better person and treat women more respectfully. She says, “He has been working on a major foundation with U.S.C. with one of the largest grants for female directors, which started well over a year ago.” So that tracks exactly with the plan she had laid out for him.

megan twohey

She’s executing — what is it? Tactic number four. So there we are, moments from publishing the story, and the role of Lisa Bloom is finally coming into focus. Within a week, we’d realize that her mother, Gloria Allred, had also played a surprising role.

michael barbaro