Media
Nuzzi, in the wake of a relationship with RFK Jr., filed for a civil protection order against Lizza, who “emphatically” denies her allegations.
Political reporter Olivia Nuzzi is accusing ex-fiancé Ryan Lizza, a fellow journalist, of blackmail and harassment, according to a petition she filed Tuesday for a civil protection order against him. The public allegations landed 12 days after the revelation that Nuzzi had a personal relationship with presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., which led to her employer, New York magazine, placing her on leave while it conducted a third-party review of her journalism.
In her petition, filed in D.C. Superior Court, Nuzzi accused Lizza of threatening “to make public personal information about me to destroy my life, career, and reputation – a threat he has since carried out.” She also alleged that Lizza stole a “personal device” from her, threatened to share materials from the device with the media through “anonymous channels,” and impersonated an “anonymous campaign operative” while contacting a political campaign with information that would further negatively impact her career.
“In the last few months it is my understanding that he began hacking my devices for the purpose of stalking and surveilling me and to collect materials” that could be used “as blackmail to intimidate me back into a relationship” with Lizza, Nuzzi wrote in her petition, which did not mention Kennedy.
She also alleges that Lizza threatened her with physical violence to force her into assuming “his share of financial responsibility to a joint contract with a book publisher.” Nuzzi and Lizza were collaborating on a highly anticipated book on the 2020 presidential campaign; their publisher paused the project in December 2021.
Lizza, co-author of Politico’s Playbook newsletter, denied Nuzzi’s allegations in a statement to The Washington Post: “I am saddened that my ex-fiancée would resort to making a series of false accusations against me as a way to divert attention from her own personal and professional failings. I emphatically deny these allegations and I will defend myself against them vigorously and successfully.”
At a hearing Tuesday, D.C. Superior Court Magistrate Judge Robert Hildum granted a temporary protection order. Another hearing is scheduled for Oct. 15, when the order expires. Nuzzi did not immediately respond to requests from The Post for comment. CNN broke the news of Tuesday’s court filing.
Nuzzi was placed on leave last month after she told New York magazine that she had a personal relationship with Kennedy while she was reporting on the 2024 presidential election.
At that time, Nuzzi said in a statement to CNN’s Brian Stelter that “the relationship was never physical but should have been disclosed to prevent the appearance of a conflict.I deeply regret not doing so immediately and apologize to those I’ve disappointed, especially my colleagues at New York.”
“An internal review of her published work has found no inaccuracies nor evidence of bias,” New York magazine said in a statement then. “She is currently on leave from the magazine, and the magazine is conducting a more thorough third-party review. We regret this violation of our readers’ trust.”
In a memo to his staff, David Haskell, the magazine’s top editor, wrote that the episode had created “the appearance of a conflict” as well as a “cloud of distraction.”
Kennedy, who is married to actress Cheryl Hines, has not commented publicly on the Nuzzi news. A representative previously said in a statement that “Mr. Kennedy only met Olivia Nuzzi once in his life for an interview she requested, which yielded a hit piece.” Nuzzi’s November 2023 story in New York was headlined “The Mind-Bending Politics of RFK Jr.’s Spoiler Campaign.”
After the news broke last month, Lizza wrote in Playbook that he wouldn’t report on Kennedy moving forward “because of my connection to this story through my ex-fiancée.”
Nuzzi is a celebrated and provocative chronicler of the Trump era who has written multiple candidate profiles during the 2024 race, including a piece on President Joe Biden’s mental state that was published during her relationship with Kennedy, who was then challenging Biden for the presidency. Nuzzi has written trenchantly of other presidential candidates, including Donald Trump.
Her career took off in 2013 after she wrote a piece for the New York Daily News that detailed her experience as an intern for former Democratic U.S. representative Anthony Weiner. From there, she wrote for the Daily Beast about Trump’s rise, before joining New York magazine in 2017.
Keith L. Alexander and Will Sommer contributed to this report.