New Yorker Suspends Jeffrey Toobin for Masturbating on Zoom Call
By: Laura Wagner (vice)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The New Yorker has suspended reporter Jeffrey Toobin for masturbating on a Zoom video chat between members of the New Yorker and WNYC radio last week. Toobin says he did not realize his video was on.
"I made an embarrassingly stupid mistake, believing I was off-camera. I apologize to my wife, family, friends and co-workers," Toobin told Motherboard.
"I believed I was not visible on Zoom. I thought no one on the Zoom call could see me. I thought I had muted the Zoom video," he added.
Two people who were on the call told VICE separately that the call was an election simulation featuring many of the New Yorker's biggest stars: Jane Mayer was playing establishment Republicans; Evan Osnos was Joe Biden, Jelani Cobb was establishment Democrats, Masha Gessen played Donald Trump, Andrew Marantz was the far right, Sue Halpern was left wing democrats, Dexter Filkins was the military, and Jeffrey Toobin playing the courts. There were also a handful of other producers on the call from the New Yorker and WNYC.
Both people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak freely, noted that it was unclear how much each person saw, but both said that they saw Toobin jerking off. The two sources described a juncture in the election simulation when there was a strategy session, and the Democrats and Republicans went into their respective break out rooms for about 10 minutes. At this point, they said, it seemed like Toobin was on a second video call. The sources said that when the groups returned from their break out rooms, Toobin lowered the camera. The people on the call said they could see Toobin touching his penis. Toobin then left the call. Moments later, he called back in, seemingly unaware of what his colleagues had been able to see, and the simulation continued.
Subscribe to The Mail, Motherboard's newsletter and print zine about the USPS.
New Yorker spokesperson Natalie Raabe said: "Jeffrey Toobin has been suspended while we investigate the matter."
Toobin's Conde Nast email has been disabled and he has not tweeted since October 13. He did, however, appear on CNN, where he is the network's chief legal analyst, on Saturday. "Jeff Toobin has asked for some time off while he deals with a personal issue, which we have granted," CNN said in a statement.
The New Yorker editor David Remnick wrote in an email to all New Yorker staffers: "Dear All, As you may have read in various news reports today, one of our writers, Jeff Toobin, was suspended after an incident on a Zoom call last week. Please be assured that we take such matters seriously and that we are looking into it. Best, David."
A source told Motherboard that WNYC informed its staff on Monday that Toobin can no longer be booked on its shows, or work with WNYC in any other professional capacity.
Doubleday, an imprint of Random House, which published Toobin's latest book did not respond to emails. Neither did Toobin's literary agent Kristine Dahl nor Greater Talent Network, which represents Toobin. WNYC declined to comment.
Joseph Cox contributed reporting.
This piece has been updated with more detail about the call and WNYC. The headline has been updated to reflect that Toobin was masturbating.
Tagged:cnnNew YorkerzoomJeffrey Toobinworldnewsoopsie
Get a personalized roundup of VICE's best stories in your inbox.
Subscribe
By signing up to the VICE newsletter you agree to receive electronic communications from VICE that may sometimes include advertisements or sponsored content.
Tags
Who is online
115 visitors
This holier than though business with sex scandals. Let me tell you, there are plenty to go around on both sides of the political fence. But it is always fun to point out the latest if it suits your political agenda, right?
I could print out a page-load from both parties from just 2017 till now. All it means is that men have a hard time keeping it in their pants and stopping their urges.
No woman should be shocked there.
Yes ma'am!
There is no way this wasn't going to be a big deal. Much of that will just be in the form of jokes. But if you don't see grounds for outrage, keep in mind that he wasn't caught on video just jerking to porn or his private thoughts in a place where he had a reasonable expectation of privacy (like his bedroom, for example). He was using Zoom to jerk it over some other person who was in this meeting. There's no other explanation in my mind.
Just imagine if you were at an in-person meeting and you realize the guy on the other side of the table is rubbing himself while checking you out. This is the same kind of thing. That actually is worthy of a little outrage.
I'm right. You're free to throw out your own theory, but I doubt you will. Whatever it is, I can promise it's wrong unless it's more sordid than what I thought of.
I think this guy may have brought his career as a television personality to a close. I'm at a loss as for why people think this is a political issue though. Because he works for CNN? You would have to establish that there is a culture of such behavior at CNN, such as was the case when Fox News was hit with a slew of sexual harassment charges from women that worked there. Absent a systemic atmosphere of this sort of behavior at CNN, it is a personal problem for Toobin and nothing more.
It's not, of course. But our politics is so tribal. Anytime somebody does something wrong, some people with opposing politics try to declare that the nefarious act is somehow a result of the politics or people who behave that way are the kind of people who join that party, etc. It's dumb.
I don't know. Is someone saying that?
You won't see me saying otherwise.
Some of them power through. Frankly, I am happy when a good guy can make lemon-ade out of lemons. The problem for me is when a bad person powers through his or her moment on fame-shame and persists to be a cocky, arrogant, incorrigible to other people. I like to see good people power through life's terrible moments. The arrogant can leave the stage and never come back. But that is a whole other set of reasons.
I guarantee you this is not the first time he has done this. If you haven't figured it out yet, he is secretly jerking off to someone else who is in the meeting. I would bet real money he has done this before, several times. He just screwed up and got caught this time.
So you know Toobin's motivations, or are you offering cold hard cash for a stack of rumors, innuendoes, and suppositions? Which is it?
Yeah I do. I know men. Let's not pretend we're ignorant. What do you think he was doing? Checking for skin cancer?
I do know men and for that reason I can't say what the heaven was his motivation. I could say more, but what would be gained about 'digging deep into men's shorts?'
Let me go on record here. After some (more) review:
In sum, Jeffrey's apology (to the group and others) is about getting caught, and not all about this lapse in professionalism and piss poor timing in treating the proceedings as a lesser meeting - not deserving of his full attention.
I stand corrected (on this major point).
Mr. Jeffrey Toobin has displayed a problem "area" in his professional life.
Here's a handshake to give you the shivers:
Weiner was contagious?
Ha Ha! Apparently.