'Progressive' PR Firm Goes Belly Up Amid Allegations of Sexual Harassment

FitzGibbon Media, a prominent progressive public relations firm, abruptly shut down on Thursday amid allegations of sexual harassment and assault by the company’s president.

Trevor FitzGibbon and his team worked with some of the biggest progressive organizations, including NARAL, MoveOn, the Center for American Progress and the AFL-CIO, as well as Wikileaks, Chelsea Manning and The Intercept. The company sponsored an event with The Huffington Post earlier this year.

Multiple female employees came forward with accusations of sexual harassment and assault against FitzGibbon, according to employees who spoke with The Huffington Post.

The news of the firm’s abrupt closure shook up the Washington progressive community. Former clients, such as MoveOn and UltraViolet, expressed their shock and disappointment. Many organizations immediately began looking at ways to help or hire the former FitzGibbon employees, and some individuals started a documentlisting job openings.

It is with tremendous regret that we had to close FitzGibbon Media. Our team was at the helm of many of the most important policy debates of our time. We were the undisputed communications leader for the progressive movement. Although the company is closing, our talents and our mission remain unchanged.

The allegations against me are a distraction to the mission at hand. In order to do what is best for the company, I took a leave of absence. However, it is abundantly clear that an irreconcilable difference has arisen between the FitzGibbon team and me.  We had no choice but to make the difficult decision to close FitzGibbon Media.

I apologize to my team and our clients for the impact this closing will have on them.  I will work to once again regain the trust that was lost.

FitzGibbon Media worked with some of the most radical organizations on the hard left, including NARAL, MoveOn.org, the National Center for Transgender Equality, Daily Kos, Pro-Choice America, Color of Change, the Center for American Progress and most notably the “Equal Rights Advocates,” a group that “protects and expands economic and educational access and opportunities for women and girls.” Ahem!

The company led the charge against Mozilla co-founder/CEO Brendan Eich — the inventor of Javascript — in April of 2014, when he was forced him to step down amid boycotts. The CEO was hounded out of his position for the sin of donating $1,000 to support California’s Prop 8 in 2008 which provided that only marriage between a man and a woman was valid. They were also known to take special pleasure in harassing the conservative free-market organization, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

Fitzgibbon’s client list is here.

Here is a FitzGibbon promo video from about a year ago:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmJNTaNYYpk]