Brendan McDermid/Reuters
Two former Fox News employees have joined a defamation lawsuit against the network and ex-star host Bill O’Reilly. Andrea Mackris and Rebecca Gomez Diamond, who both reached settlements with O’Reilly and Fox after accusing the host of sexual harassment, joined the lawsuit filed by former Fox producer and fellow O’Reilly accuser Rachel Wittlieb Bernstein. “These women were specifically identified in the NY Times article, to which O’Reilly and Fox responded with false and defamatory statements,” the trio’s lawyer said in a statement. “They are tired of being smeared with lies by a bully who thinks that his victims are afraid to answer them.” The suit specifically cites the Fox and O’Reilly claims that none of the accusers ever used an internal hotline to complain about any harassing behavior. Mackris is the former O’Reilly staffer who famously reached a 2004 settlement with the host after suing him for, among many things, masturbating while on the phone with her and fantasizing about fondling her with a loofah (which he mistakenly called a “falafel,” per transcripts). Diamond Gomez, too, reached a settlement, in 2011, after producing audio tapes featuring O’Reilly making unwanted sexual advances at her.