A former Boston TV news anchor filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday alleging that she faced anti-white discrimination while working at the station.
Former WBZ This Morning and WBZ News at Noon co-anchor Kate Merrill abruptly left her job at WBZ-TV last year without explanation, ending her 20-year tenure at the station. Now, the Emmy-winning journalist is suing the Boston news station, its parent company — Columbia Broadcasting/Paramount Global/CBS, a Black WBZ-TV anchor/reporter, the station’s only Black meteorologist, the station’s former general manager and Paramount’s vice president of employee relations for damages.
In the lawsuit, Merrill claims that CBS/Paramount launched a flawed investigation into allegations that she’d behaved in a racist manner towards other WBZ-TV employees that resulted in her demotion, harm to her reputation and ultimately her resignation. She also alleges that the media company failed to adequately investigate a complaint she made against WBZ-TV Meteorologist Jason Mikell after he yelled at her on set at the station.
Merrill denies any allegations of racial bias against non-white WBZ-TV staff and labels herself as “anti-racist” in the lawsuit. Neither WBZ-TV nor CBS/Paramount responded to a request for comment Wednesday evening.
Anti-white discrimination allegations against CBS/Paramount
The lawsuit begins by arguing that, beginning in 2019, CBS/Paramount began implementing policies intended to increase racial diversity across all its programming and affiliate stations in response to criticism by its former diversity director that the media company had “a white problem.”
The policies included hiring targets to increase the percentage of people of color among a variety of staff and stars, according to the lawsuit. In the wake of this, many white former employees filed lawsuits against the company.
The change in policies also impacted WBZ-TV, according to the lawsuit. The suit alleges that CBS’s head of East Coast stations declared the Boston station the “whitest of all their stations” and refused to allow the hiring of new white employees — even when there were no non-white candidates, leading to complaints from managers at the station.
The lawsuit then details a list of alleged examples in which WBZ-TV demoted or terminated white news staff — many of whom were highly qualified and had worked there for years — and replaced them with non-white news staff who were less qualified and experienced. It also cites situations in which non-white news staff were promoted over more experienced white new staff, as well as times it failed to investigate or take action in the wake of non-white staff behaving improperly in the workplace.
“In short, WBZ / CBS / Paramount adopted and began to implement policies of reverse discrimination,” the lawsuit reads.
The beginning of the end for Kate Merrill
Most of Merrill’s complaints center around alleged incidents involving Meteorologist Jason Mikell and the station and CBS/Paramount’s response. At first, she had a “warm” relationship with Mikell and tried to support his transition to working for a Boston news station, according to the lawsuit.
The first incident occurred in February 2024 when Mikell allegedly “implied that Ms. Merrill and her co-anchor had sexual relations at a gazebo” on air, the lawsuit states. She reported the incident to the station and other staff reported it to CBS/Paramount, but to her knowledge, neither investigated the incident, and the meteorologist was never disciplined for his alleged actions.
Despite this, Merrill continued to support Mikell and have a good relationship with him — that is, until April 3, 2024, when she texted him privately to correct his mispronunciation of the town of Concord during a weather segment that had just aired, according to the lawsuit. Despite the fact that the meteorologist had purportedly previously asked her for such corrections, he “immediately confronted Ms. Merrill, loudly yelling at her on the studio floor and asserting that she was being critical of him.”
Merrill reported the incident to WBZ-TV later that day, according to the lawsuit. But, a week after the confrontation, Michael Roderick, Paramount’s vice president of employee relations, informed her that “an investigation was being conducted into allegations that she treated coworkers differently because of their race.”
CBS/Paramount’s investigations
Merrill soon learned that Mikell and another Black WBZ-TV employee — anchor/reporter Courtney Cole — had “simultaneously raised complaints about her directly to the Legal Department at Paramount,” according to the lawsuit. Among Mikell’s complaints were allegations that she was overly critical of him and had made racially charged comments, such as that, upon joining the station, she said “he would ‘find his people’ here.” Cole’s complaints were similar to Mikell’s.
Despite Merrill suggesting that Roderick interview many WBZ-TV employees as witnesses on her behalf in both cases, on Friday, May 17, 2024, he informed her that he had corroborated the complaints against her, but was unable to corroborate her complaint against Mikell, according to the lawsuit. Roderick did not provide her a copy of his investigation report, if one exists.
Then-WBZ-TV General Manager Justin Draper soon issued Merrill a written warning based on Roderick’s findings that her “behavior was grounded in microaggressions or unconscious bias and created a very unwelcoming work environment,” according to the lawsuit. The warning stated that both investigations were now closed, but that she could face further disciplinary action if such behavior continued — up to facing termination — and required that she complete an unconscious bias training.
Why Merrill resigned
In addition to the written warning, Draper informed Merrill that he was “demoting her from her role as co-anchor of the Weekday Morning Show to working weekend nights, stating that decision ‘had been in the works for some time,’” according to the lawsuit. Merrill was not aware of any outstanding concern over her job performance, and despite Draper’s characterization of how the decision had been made, a lawyer for WBZ-TV later stated that “the findings of Defendant Roderick’s investigation had in fact played a role in the decision.”
Soon after the decision was made to demote Merrill, Draper announced the change in two staff meetings — something he hadn’t done when other staff were demoted, according to the lawsuit. This caused her great reputational harm.
“Demoting Ms. Merrill in the context of the investigation her sent the false message to her professional colleagues that she had engaged in serious wrongdoing,” the lawsuit reads. “ … Because of the catastrophic damage a demotion would have caused her career, especially in the context of allegations that she was racist, on May 24, 2024, Ms. Merrill gave notice of constructive discharge resignation, effective immediately.”
Because Merrill had signed a non-compete agreement with WBZ-TV that didn’t expire until June 1, 2025, she was unable to work in her industry and “suffered significant financial losses,” according to the lawsuit. The station has also, to-date, failed to pay her for her paid leave she accrued prior to her resignation.
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