Sage Steele slams ESPN’s ‘hypocrisy’ in interview with Megyn Kelly
Sage Steele is insanely angry and she won’t take it anymore.
The former ESPN host appeared on SiriusXM’s ‘The Megyn Kelly Show’ on Thursday and spoke for two hours. The conversation turned to the legal dispute she settled with the Worldwide Leader earlier this week.
Steele had sued ESPN for retaliating against her by withdrawing orders after her appearance on a podcast by former NFL quarterback Jay Cutler in 2021.
On the show, she made controversial statements about being forced to get vaccinated against COVID and about former President Barack Obama identifying as black in the census.
Steele made it clear she’s tired of holding back, saying she’s “not afraid to speak up anymore.”
“I refuse to keep quiet about this any longer,” Steele said. “I don’t care because that’s my experience. … I’m allowed to feel how I feel. If you try to shut me up, I’m done.”
Central to Steele’s lawsuit was her allegation that she was held to different standards than her peers, saying, “You can’t have it both ways.”
Steele feels unfairly treated because several colleagues went on the air to speak about race relations in the United States following the 2020 killing of George Floyd and none of them have been punished for speaking about what was on their mind.
However, she did have “direct” and “private” conversations with ESPN bosses because she believed she was doing what her peers were doing, which was spreading personal opinions on sensitive social and political issues.
What differed from Steele’s case was that her words went against company policy and culture.
“All I ever wanted was consistency,” Steele said.
“And if we allow my colleagues to say things on social media, let alone on our own airwaves … that have nothing to do with political sports … then I should take the time to offer my opinion on my personal experiences, without telling others what to do… I think that’s exactly what breaks my heart. That there were different rules for me than for everyone else.”
ESPN “incapacitated” Steele in October 2021 after she tested positive for COVID, allegedly forcing her to apologize before allowing her back in the air, and she made it clear to Kelly that she felt she had no other choice.
“I didn’t want to apologize,” Steele said. “I fought. I fought and begged and yelled and was told that if I want to keep my job I have to apologize if I want to keep my job. … I knew there was a line somewhere. I just didn’t know where it was , until I crossed it.”
Upon returning to work, Steele admitted that the lack of support from her ESPN colleagues upset her, saying she was “trembling” and “scared” when she returned to the office.
What Steele remembered was “the hypocrisy of the rules,” and she criticized ESPN for choosing which rules to enforce on whom.
In April 2022, Steele filed a lawsuit against ESPN, alleging that the network retaliated against her for comments she made on Cutler’s podcast, a show that has no affiliation with ESPN or Disney, the sports network’s owner.
On Tuesday, Steele announced that she had settled her lawsuit against ESPN and was leaving the company.
