Bette Midler Claims Geraldo Rivera Drugged & Groped Her In 1970s

Bette Midler called out Fox News personality Geraldo Rivera after he defended Matt Lauer in a tweet.

BETTE MIDLER SAYS GERALDO RIVERA DRUGGED & GROPED HER

Rivera said he was “sad about Matt Lauer” after the Today show co-host was fired amid allegations of sexual harassment. In response, Midler posted a clip from an interview she did with Barbara Walters in 1991 in which she claimed that Rivera had drugged and groped her back in the ’70s.

“Sad about @MLauer great guy, highly skilled & empathetic w guests & a real gentleman to my family & me. News is a flirty business & it seems like current epidemic of #SexHarassmentAllegations may be criminalizing courtship & conflating it w predation. What about #GarrisonKeillor?” read Rivera’s tweet.

Later, he tweeted again to apologize for his original message. “Reaction to my tweets today on #sexharassment makes clear I didn’t sufficiently explain that this is a horrendous problem long hidden-Harassers are deviants who deserve what is coming to them-Often victims are too frightened to come forward in a timely fashion-I humbly apologize,” he said.

Midler captioned her tweet, “I feel like this video was a gift from the universe to me. Geraldo may have apologized for his tweets supporting Matt Lauer, but he has yet to apologize for this.”

Midler, who turns 72 today, said at the time of the video, “He and his producer left the crew in the other room, they pushed me into my bathroom, they broke two poppers and pushed them under my nose, and proceeded to grope me. I did not offer myself up on the altar of Geraldo Rivera. He was unseemly. His behavior was unseemly,” she said.

Years after the encounter, Rivera published a book in which he bragged about sleeping with Midler in the 1970s. “If I had known 20 years later he was going to wind up a slimy talk show host I never would have even let him in the room,” she said in the video. “You never know at the time if these things are gonna come back to haunt you.”