Katie Couric Says Matt Lauer Allegations Sometimes ‘Blown out of Proportion’

Katie Couric said that some of the allegations against her former co-anchor Matt Lauer have been exaggerated, while others have yet to be reported.

Couric sat beside Lauer on The Today Show for 15 years, though she had moved on by the time he was fired in November. On Tuesday, she appeared on the Wendy Williams Show, where she discussed Lauer’s sexual misconduct scandal with six months of perspective.

“The full extent of what has happened, I don’t think has been truly revealed,” she said.

“Well, you know, it’s been a very painful time for a lot of people who worked with Matt, knew him, really care about him, and who never witnessed or experienced any of this behavior that is now obviously being talked about,” she said. “I don’t know the full extent of all these things that happened. I can only talk about my personal experience, and I was always treated respectfully and appropriately.”

Williams wondered whether Lauer might be back on TV in the foreseeable future, but Couric declined to speculate, adding that she wasn’t convinced the American people had the whole truth about her former co-anchor.

“That’s really not for me to say, Wendy,” she said. “I think that sort of depends on the path he chooses, and how he decides to handle what has happened.”

“The full extent of what has happened, I don’t think has been truly revealed,” she said.

Williams agreed, and she reiterated some of the fury against Lauer, reminding Couric of how much the country “trusted” him and how betrayed they felt by the revelations. She brought up the button Lauer allegedly had under his desk, allowing him to lock the door behind someone when they entered his office. In response, Couric said that “a lot of stuff gets misreported and blown out of proportion. They make it sound like some kind of den of inequity.”

“I don’t know what was happening, but a lot of NBC executives had those buttons that opened and closed doors,” Couric said. “It was really just a privacy thing.”

When Williams asked, Couric admitted that she herself didn’t have a button for her door.

“Honestly, I think it was just an executive perk that some people opted to have,” she said. “I don’t think it was a nefarious thing, I really don’t. I think that it’s been misconstrued.”

Couric was on the show to promote her new National Geographic series, America Inside Out. The show will address “anxiety among the white working class,” which may be “fueling America’s political and cultural divide.”

America Inside Out premieres on Wednesday, May 2 at 10 p.m. ET on National Geographic.