New York Times reporters Megan Twohey and Jodi Kantor on Harvey Weinstein and their version of feminism

New York Times investigative reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey sent shockwaves through media and popular culture when they published an explosive article exposing years of alleged sexual abuse covered up by Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein.

The article, “Harvey Weinstein Paid Off Sexual Harassment Accusers for Decades,” published Oct. 5, 2017, included detailed accounts of alleged abuses inflicted by Weinstein on actresses, models, and former Weinstein employees. Kantor and Twohey uncovered nearly three decades of previously undisclosed allegations against the movie mogul.

“Very early on, we had some convincing evidence that something was really, really wrong here and once we understood that better, we were so worried about botching the story and somehow failing,” Kantor told ABC News’ Rebecca Jarvis on an episode of the “No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis” podcast. “We had visions of having to watch the Oscars for the rest of our lives having to keep this material about Harvey Weinstein secret."

The bombshell report had a ripple effect. Over the next year, there was a deluge of reports of alleged sexual assault and harassment perpetrated by men across all industries and backgrounds. Between October 2017 and September 2018, there was a 12% increase in sexual harassment complaints filed, according to the EEOC and a 50% increase during the fiscal year of 2018.

The #MeToo movement, which had started in 2006 to help survivors of sexual violence find healing, gained unprecedented momentum. Days after Kantor and Twohey’s report, actress Alyssa Milano took to Twitter, posting: "If you've been sexually harassed or assaulted, write 'me too' as a reply to this tweet." The hashtag #MeToo went viral. There were more than a million tweets within 48 hours, according to Twitter, and on Facebook, there were over 12 million posts, comments, and reactions in less than 24 hours, by 4.7 million users around the world, according to the company.

But at the time, Kantor and Twohey said they didn’t know the impact their investigation and article would have. Twohey remembered a moment days before publishing when she and Kantor questioned if anyone would even care about the story.

“We've been working around the clock, and we left the office at 1 o'clock in the morning and shared a cab back to Brooklyn, and turned to each other in that rare moment of silence and said, ‘Is anybody going to read this story?’ because we were not thinking along those lines. We were just so focused on trying to get to the finish line and publish our findings.” Twohey told Jarvis.

“As one of our editors said many times, Harvey Weinstein is not that famous," Kantor said.