Carlson's team, in its brief, said the anchor is not claiming a breach of contract, since she named Ailes as the sole defendant, and did not name her employer, Fox News.

On Friday, one of Ailes' lawyers, Susan Estrich, said Carlson was trying to circumvent the arbitration clause by initially filing her suit in New Jersey Superior Court. (To do so, Carlson's team cited Ailes' ownership of a home in New Jersey.) Estrich said the case should be heard in Manhattan federal court, because Fox News is based in Manhattan; Ailes primarily resides in New York; and Carlson, a resident of Connecticut, is accusing Ailes of violating New York City's Human Rights Law. On July 8, Ailes' lawyers argued that the case should be moved to federal court and submitted for arbitration.

There could be another reason for the request. Thomas F. Doherty, a partner in the labour practice of the New Jersey law firm McCarter & English, said that a New Jersey court "may lack the authority to compel arbitration in New York." Ailes, he explained, would need to transfer the case to pursue an arbitration in New York, which is where Carlson's contract stipulates any arbitration case would have to take place.

A lawyer for Carlson, Nancy Erika Smith, called Ailes' move Friday "illegal, unprofessional and unethical."

"You don't get to judge-shop in the United States of America," she said.

In response, Irena Briganti, a Fox News spokeswoman, said: "We're trying to get this to the court where it belongs. If anything, Gretchen Carlson's lawyer was attempting to judge-shop by having this heard in her comfort zone of state court in Bergen County, where neither Roger nor Carlson reside."

On Wednesday, Carlson, 50, filed a suit in which she argued that she was fired from her weekday afternoon show on Fox News after rebuffing sexual advances from Ailes, 76. She also said she had been sexually harassed at Fox News. Her description of sexual harassment and retaliation on the part of Ailes has been followed by accounts of other women who say Ailes acted inappropriately in professional settings. But a multitude of Fox anchors and on-air personalities have also spoken in support of Ailes, saying Carlson's ratings had fallen and she was upset about being let go by the network.

Ailes has denied all the charges.

Carlson said in an interview with The New York Times this week that by filing the suit she "finally felt it was time to stand up" for herself.

The New York Times