Fox’s Shepard Smith Was Apparently A Huge Jerk To His Waitress (Also, He’s Gay)

Say what you will about Fox News, but anchor Shepard Smith is actually highly respected in the industry, even by his most bitter rivals. So it’s a bit of a shock to hear that he might have been kind of a jerk to a waitress recently.

Gawker reports that Smith and a group of friends went out drinking last March and stopped in at a Chelsea bar called Bathtub Gin. There, with a near-empty glass, Smith allegedly berated his waitress for failing to make the Fox anchor’s party her priority.

“He got up from his table, grabbed my elbow, and started yelling,” the waitress, 30-year-old Katya Minskova, told the site. Smith continued shouting, “Where the f*ck is my drink! Where is my f*cking drink! Get my f*cking drink!”

Minskova also alleged a hideous physical transformation on the part of the anchor, as well. In minutes, she watched as the suave Smith devolved into a strange, babbling goblin with very little muscle control.

“He started smacking his hands, like the back of his right hand into the palm of his left,” she said. “He was spitting. His veins were popping out.”

Gawker writes that Smith was there with a “straight couple” and “his own regular date, a muscular 6-foot-2 30-something white male, whom Bathtub Gin employees refer to as ‘his boyfriend.’ ” Wait, wait, wait a minute. Did Gawker just out Shepard Smith as a gay man?

“Like most other nights—Smith frequents the bar, located behind a coffee shop on 9th Avenue, about once a week—the anchor’s attention fell on his date. According to Minskova and one other source, who have seen Smith and his date drink there on multiple occasions, the couple frequently holds hands and rests them in each others’ laps under the table. Nobody we spoke with, including several Fox insiders, knew the name of Smith’s date.”

Suddenly, the original story is less interesting. Shepard Smith is gay? We weren’t the only ones who picked up on this seeming throwaway, either. Andy Towle of Towleroad noted the entry as a “further shattering [of] Smith’s glass closet.”

For Slate, Mark Joseph Stern focused on why outing Shepard Smith was buried in an otherwise light-hearted tantrum tale. Because, he aruges, “there’s no other way to do it without seeming sleazily reactionary.”

Of course, no one involved (Fox, Smith, Bathtub Gin) responded to various requests for comment. Shepard Smith, at least, is generally loathe to do so.