Tony Robbins Sues BuzzFeed Over ‘Premeditated and Malicious Campaign’

Motivational speaker Tony Robbins speaks during the 2016 SXSW Music, Film + Interactive Festival in Austin, Texas on March 14, 2016. Mike Windle/Getty Images for SXSW

Tony Robbins is suing BuzzFeed for a series of stories the website has published about the popular motivational speaker.

“Far from the watchdogs they once were, too many members of today’s tabloid and entertainment media ignore traditional journalistic ethics, values, and standards. Too often, in the hyper-competitive, celebrity-driven and political [sic] charged environment that currently exists, they fail to verify facts and vet sources, and are permitted to present predetermined stories supporting an agenda or outcome they believe will sow the most outrage and engagement with their target audiences whether true or not,” Robbins said in a statement on Nov. 22.

“For this reason, I am now suing BuzzFeed following a premeditated and malicious campaign against me and my life’s work.”

BuzzFeed published the sixth article accusing Robbins of wrongdoing this week.

Robbins said that BuzzFeed’s articles, which have accused the self-help guru of abusing his position, making inappropriate advances toward employees and event attendees, and berating abuse victims, are full of falsehoods and have prompted many people to dispute the claims.

One of them is Kate Ritasse, a former assistant to Robbins. She released a statement after a story quoted her, saying, “The only accurate part of what BuzzFeed said about me in their article about Tony Robbins is that Tony’s work truly impacted me and my family for the better. His work was transformational for our relationship and our life.”

“BuzzFeed told me that they wanted to talk to me so I could provide balance to their story as a positive perspective and then they twisted my words in a negative way,” she added.

Another woman quoted by BuzzFeed posted a video on YouTube refuting BuzzFeed’s stories.

“BuzzFeed has contacted me to hear about my intervention with Tony ... and how was my experience. I related my experience. I told them how it had changed my life, how my life and the way I see everything around me has totally changed,” said Analay Souza Campos.

“BuzzFeed just basically continues to try to use pieces of the intervention out of context to make their point, the point that they want to make,” she added before profusely thanking Robbins.

The logo of BuzzFeed is seen on its website on a computer screen in a file photograph Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images

In a statement emailed to The Epoch Times, BuzzFeed Director of Communication Matt Mittenthal said: “BuzzFeed News’ series of reports on Tony Robbins are based on hundreds of interviews, audio recordings, and documentary evidence. Our latest story about an alleged sexual assault is based on the accounts of dozens of people, as well as contemporaneous journal entries. The evidence speaks for itself, and we stand by our rigorous reporting.”

Two of the reporters working on the series of stories made similar comments on Twitter. Jane Bradley, one of the reporters working on the series about Robbins, said that the latest accusations against him include him being accused of assaulting a minor. The allegation was “corroborated by dozens of others, eyewitnesses & even a teenage diary,” she tweeted after the suit was announced.

Robbins said in a statement that one of BuzzFeed’s articles, claiming he “punished his followers” by making them drink an “unidentified brown liquid” was quickly rebutted by his team, which shared the recipe for the drink and a video of why the drink is used.

“Unsurprisingly, BuzzFeed did not acknowledge key facts we shared since that would have ruined their narrative that I was somehow doing something injurious to my attendees,” Robbins said.

He noted that a Pew Research Center study found BuzzFeed was the least trusted news source, or last in a field of 36 media outlets that were listed. He also noted that BuzzFeed’s editor-in-chief Ben Smith said in 2014 that he rejects “formalistic rules like ‘you have to have two sources to go with something.’”

“It’s easy to get nine sources to say the same thing and still get it wrong. I prefer to rely on smart reporters and on Twitter,” Smith said at the time, suggesting that the outlet publishes stories with little information and updates them as reporters get more details. BuzzFeed openly says that in reporting on some topics, “there aren’t two sides to every story.”

The outlet is also infamous for publishing the Trump–Russia dossier without confirming any of the dossier’s allegations and for getting other stories wrong about the investigation into the dossier, including a claim it later corrected about Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former lawyer.

BuzzFeed, including a reporter who has worked on articles about Robbins, is charged in another pending lawsuit, having allegedly “purposely, consistently, with motive and agenda omit critical facts they were privy to before publishing the articles such that they knew they were not publishing the truth.”

A previous version of this article misspelled Matt Mittenthal’s name. The Epoch Times regrets the error.