Erin Andrews spent eight years as a correspondent for ESPN. In 2008, during her tenure with the network, Michael David Barrett booked a Nashville hotel room next to the one in which she was staying. Using a peephole he created, Barrett filmed Andrews unclothed in her room. After unsuccessfully attempting to sell the footage to TMZ, he posted it online. Andrews sued and was awarded $55 million in damages in 2016.
Testifying at the trial, Andrews revealed her ESPN bosses gave her an ultimatum, forcing her to do a television interview in which she would have to relive the whole painful experience. “Because there wasn’t an arrest, because we didn’t know where this happened, my bosses at ESPN told me, ‘Before you go back on air for college football we need you to give a sit-down interview.’ And that was the only way I was going to be allowed back,” Andrews testified, as reported by Deadspin.
According to Andrews, her superiors recommended “Good Morning America” on ABC (which, like ESPN, was owned by Disney). She eventually agreed to appear on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. “I talked to her producers, I told her I didn’t want to do it. But this was the only way I was going to be put back on air, so we went to the ‘Oprah’ show,” she said. After exiting ESPN in 2012, she joined Fox Sports. In addition, from 2014 until 2020 Andrews co-hosted “Dancing With the Stars.”
