Falwell denies he quit over sex scandal, cites ‘leave’
Jerry Falwell Jr. said Monday evening that he had not resigned as the president of Liberty University, rebuffing news reports in which school officials said he stepped down amid a brewing sex scandal.
“I have not resigned,” Falwell told Politico. “I will be on indefinite leave.”
The comments by Falwell, a close friend and early supporter of President Donald Trump, came hours after he was accused of routinely watching his wife have sex with a hotel pool attendant with whom the Falwells later partnered for business.
School officials later told multiple news outlets that they would be negotiating with Falwell through Monday evening.
At the center of the controversy is a Reuters story in which a former business associate, Giancarlo Granda, said he’d had a yearslong affair with Falwell’s wife, Becky.
On Sunday, ahead of the Reuters story, Falwell released a separate statement to the Washington Examiner in which he said the affair occurred, but Granda used it to attempt to extort the Falwell family.
In the Reuters story published on Monday, Granda alleged that he had sex with Falwell’s wife numerous times while Jerry Falwell watched “from the corner of the room.” Falwell denied that allegation when asked about it by Reuters.
Falwell, son of the famed evangelist of the same name, had been at the helm of Liberty University since his father’s death in 2007. Liberty in Lynchburg, Va., is the nation’s largest Christian school.
Since taking over, Falwell, a former real estate developer with no ministerial training, helped transform the college and its once-beleaguered finances.
He also was a point of controversy for, among other things, his endorsement of then-candidate Trump, comments about Muslims, and for increasingly lashing out at critics online.
Then, earlier this month, Falwell posted, then deleted, a photo in which he and a young, pregnant woman posed with their pants undone and stomachs showing while on a yacht.
That and other images that Falwell posted on his public Instagram were eventually shared by a Houston Chronicle reporter on Twitter.
Falwell later apologized to the woman without addressing the myriad other issues critics took with the photo.
Days later, he took an indefinite leave of absence from his position at Liberty.