George Stephanopolous and ABC News have reached a new multi-year deal that will keep the longtime anchor on the broadcaster for the near future. The news comes amid fallout over the $15 million settlement ABC reached with President-elect Donald Trump over the weekend.
The news should put an end to speculation that Stephanopolous, who is believed to earn $20 million a year, would be leaving the network. Details about the deal have not been made public.
Stephanopolous and ABC News agreed to pay a $15 million donation to a future Trump presidential foundation, to pay $1 million in his legal fees, and to publicly apologize to Trump.
“ABC News and George Stephanopoulos regret statements regarding President Donald J. Trump made during an interview by George Stephanopoulos with Rep. Nancy Mace on ABC’s This Week on March 10, 2024,” Stephanopoulos and ABC News said in a statement Sunday.
Trump filed his lawsuit against ABC News and Stephanopoulos in March. The federal suit followed a heated discussion with Congresswoman Nancy Mace in which Stephanopoulos questioned Mace, an outspoken survivor of rape, about her endorsement of Trump.
The pair’s back and forth was about author E. Jean Carroll’s own lawsuit against Trump. Carroll accused Trump of rape, and a Manhattan jury found Trump liable for sexual battery and defamation. Judge Lewis Kaplan later clarified the ruling came down to New York’s limited legal definition of “rape” and said that it did not mean Carroll “failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’”
Stephanopoulos initially appeared unthreatened by Trump’s lawsuit. He told Stephen Colbert in May, “[Mace] famously started her political career… when she was in the statehouse, talking about being a victim of rape. And so, I asked her, as a victim of rape, how she could support someone who a jury has found liable for rape.”
“Trump sued me because I used the word ‘rape,’ even though a judge said that’s in fact what did happen,” he also said.
The Los Angeles Times was the first to report this news.
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