Disney Exec Accused of Sabotage After Lawsuit Threat
Just days into the new year, ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel found himself at the center of some disturbing allegations. On January 2, New York Jets star Aaron Rodgers went on The Pat McAfee Show and appeared to accuse Jimmy Kimmel of being an associate of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein had been arrested in July 2019, on charges of child sex trafficking.
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Epstein was known to have associated with powerful men like Prince Andrew of England and former Presidents Donald Trump and Bill Clinton. He allegedly supplied them with young — sometimes underage — women on a private island owned by Epstein. It was alleged that Epstein kept a list of all the names of the people he worked with — including those he supplied young girls to.
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During his appearance on The Pat McAfee Show, Rodgers said that people like Jimmy Kimmel are scared for the list to come out. Rodgers also said that he would be popping a bottle of champagne when the list came out. Just hours later, Kimmel shot back, saying that he never met Epstein, and threatened Rodgers with a lawsuit.
The next day, Pat McAfee went on his show and apologized to Kimmel for what was said. While he was first apologetic, it seems that attitude has now transformed into anger.
On Friday, January 5, McAfee accused an ESPN executive of purposefully sabotaging his show. The person he accused was Norby Williamson, the head of production at the famed sports studio.
“There are some people actively trying to sabotage us from within ESPN. More specifically I believe Norby Williamson is the guy who is attempting to sabotage our program.”
He believed that Williamson was targeting him because Williamson didn’t think McAfee’s ratings were high enough. McAfee’s ratings and salary were sent to The New York Post, who published the info. McAfee further accused Williamson of leaking that information, citing that the executive was the only one who knew about it.
ESPN — which is owned by Disney — did not take kindly to the accusations and quickly defended Williamson.
“No one is more committed to and invested in ESPN’s success than Norby Williamson. At the same time, we are thrilled with the multi-platform success that we have seen from the Pat McAfee Show across ESPN. We will handle this matter internally and have no further comment.”
McAfee also admitted that he does not like Williamson.
Jemele Hill, who was a former host on SportsCenter, said that McAfee committed the ultimate Disney sin — attacking another Disney/ABC/ESPN host on-air. She believed that Disney or ESPN would have to step in to make sure that Kimmel didn’t follow through on his threat.
Hill further speculated that she thinks The Pat McAfee show will be canceled because of the chaos caused by Rodgers.
Do you think Pat McAfee’s show is being sabotaged? Or is McAfee just lashing out? Let us know in the comments.
