Ailes’ black ops tactics against New York magazine reporter and Ailes biographer Gabe Sherman were apparently more menacing than just online smears and negative Google ads. A source close to high-level Fox News executives told Morning Media that during a private conversation with Ailes at an event in the period when Sherman was reporting his 2014 book, “The Loudest Voice in the Room,” Ailes said to this source, “I know where he lives, and I’m gonna send people to beat the shit out of him.” (A second source within the Fox News orbit confirmed hearing the same account and a third said Ailes has said some version of this before.)

The first source also relayed a separate conversation in which the source was told, “If it ever came out,” meaning the lengths Ailes went to in his campaign against Sherman, “multiple people at Fox would go to jail.” There’s suspicion, sources said, that phone records were obtained illegally. At one point, Sherman and his wife explored the possibility of having their apartment swept for bugs, according to a source familiar with the matter. Ailes’ attorney, Susan Estrich, did not respond to requests for comment. Sherman declined to comment.