Billy Bush has hired prominent LA attorney Marshall Grossman to negotiate his exit from NBC News, THR reports. NBC News suspended Bush on Sunday following the publication of a 2005 videotape in which Bush and Donald Trump are recorded having a lewd conversation about then-Access Hollywood co-host Nancy O’Dell, and women in general.
Without discussing where negotiations are currently, Grossman defended his client saying he did what was expected of him.
Bush, Grossman says, was an NBC Universal employee interviewing an NBC star in The Apprentice’s Trump, so he wasn’t exactly in a position to challenge his interview subject. “If Billy had been passive or responded ‘Shut the f— up’ to Trump, Billy would have been out of a job the next day,” Grossman said.
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Bush, who reportedly makes $3 million per year, reportedly discussed the existence of the tape when he was in Brazil covering the Summer Olympics for NBC and Access Hollywood. But NBC News says management including Today senior vp Noah Oppenheim and News division chairman Andy Lack were not made aware of the tape until early last week, days before the Washington Post was sent a copy of the tape, and published a story just hours after confirming its authenticity.