Gumbel Puts Abernathy in Hot Seat Over His Book, but All’s Well That Ends Well

NEW YORK —  In a dramatic interview that lasted nearly 20 minutes, “Today” anchor Bryant Gumbel on Tuesday closely questioned civil-rights leader Rev. Ralph Abernathy about his motives in including allegations about Dr. Martin Luther King’s sexual activities in his controversial new book.

“Why did you do it when you knew what you would reveal would give great comfort to those who would like to demean Rev. King?” Gumbel asked Abernathy, a close friend of the late King’s. “Why do something so clearly contrary to his wishes?”

“I wanted to show that Martin Luther King was simply a human being, not a god, not a saint,” Abernathy replied. “I wanted to tell the truth, nothing but the truth, so help me God.”

In “And the Walls Came Tumbling Down,” Abernathy, one of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the 1960s, writes that King had liaisons with two women and fought with a third on the night before he was shot to death in 1968. Abernathy has been severely criticized by black civil-rights leaders for besmirching King’s memory and demeaning his accomplishments.

Jane Pauley, Gumbel’s co-anchor, told “Today” viewers after the interview, which ran 10 minutes longer than scheduled, that Gumbel had been doing some “soul-searching” about focusing on the allegations, which take up only a few pages in the book. In an interview taped last week with Abernathy in Atlanta, Gumbel did not ask Abernathy about the allegations. But as they became the subject of more publicity, the earlier piece was shelved and Gumbel decided to address them in a live studio interview.

At the end of the interview, Abernathy said, “God bless you, Bryant” to Gumbel. “I don’t think the good doctor has a mean bone in his body,” Gumbel said to Pauley.