A former VP/General Manager of the CBS News & Stations property serving Baltimore — a 28-year industry veteran who became a leadership coach after her March 2022 exit — has lost a battle waged against Paramount Global pertaining to a bonus she claimed was owed to her as part of her employment agreement.
Audra Swain served as the head of WJZ-13 in Baltimore from September 2017 through her departure, following a 17-year tenure at Sinclair Inc. that saw her lead KSNV-3 in Las Vegas from January 2010 until relocating to Maryland for the CBS job.
At the time of her hire, embattled former CBS Television Stations President Peter Dunn was her boss. For Swain, who attended Penn State University, it marked a return to a market where she earned her first TV management experience, as Local Sales Manager for Sinclair’s flagship property, Fox affiliate WBFF-45.
When Dunn exited, Wendy McMahon became Swain’s new boss as President/Co-Head of CBS News and Stations. Then, in August 2021, McMahon hired Adrienne Roark as President of CBS Stations for the East Coast Region, making Roark Swain’s direct C-Suite leader.
Fast-forward to March 2022, when Swain’s employment was terminated by Paramount Global. Performance issues were flagged by three different managers — Dunn, McMahon and Roark — and by human resources before she took short-term disability leave. In particular, Roark stated in a declaration to the Maryland Federal District Court that Swain “was hard to reach, took vacation without leaving anyone in charge or any direction for her staff while she was gone, and did not appear to have a good understanding of what was going on at her station.”
Swain was aware of the performance issues. She acknowledged them and the inability to meet the expectations of her job in a progress questionnaire filled out for her psychiatrist on September 27, 2021, in which she stated, “At my job, I am not able to make clear and concise decisions. I cannot focus and am angry.”
Attendance was also an issue, while professionalism was addressed, too. Cynthia Glasgow, SVP of Human Resources for CBS News & Stations, even had to counsel Swain in summer 2021 “for an issue involving background noise and failure to mute her sound on a confidential Zoom meeting for CBS Stations management and the GMs of all of the CBS television stations.”
Other performance issues were outlined by CBS, including Swain’s utterance of the word “dumbass” during a Zoom meeting in which former EVP of Business Operations Michele Scaringella was speaking at the time.
Before Swain was terminated, CBS placed her on unpaid leave and presented a formal performance warning. This was on August 26, 2021, and saw a shift of pre-planned paid time off put into play. However, a short-term disability was put into play when it became clear to McMahon and Roark that mental health struggles and a new Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder claim had been presented by Swain.
Swain eventually exhausted her STD leave benefit that provided her an amount equivalent
to her full salary on December 15, 2021, resulting in a decrease in her benefit amount to 70% of her salary. She then asked to use her PTO to supplement her STD benefit and maintain her full salary; the PTO request was denied by disability insurance provider UNUM but granted after an “unprecedented request” from Swain’s psychiatrist that retroactively modified her return-to-work date.
Swain returned to work on January 10, 2022. It didn’t go well, as multiple employees complained that she left her daughter and dog outside in her car with the engine
off for three hours in the cold weather, as Swain was inside WJZ’s offices.
One week later, Swain’s performance reportedly led Broadcast Operations Manager Darrin Fox to resign. On January 31, 2022, WJZ Human Resources Manager Kathy Mitzel followed Fox’s lead.
Finally, on February 15, 2022, Paramount terminated Swain’s employment, effective March 1 of that year. Days later, Kathy Hostetter was announced as Swain’s successor with no mention of the now-former WJZ leader noted at the time.
As a result of Swain’s poor performance in the year leading up to the termination of her
employment, she was not given a discretionary payment under a company Short-Term Incentive Plan in effect in 2021. The amount of payment, if any, an eligible employee received for performance year 2021 was calculated based on four factors: the employee’s base salary, the employee’s STIP target (a percentage of the employee’s base salary), a Company Performance Multiplier, and the employee’s Individual Performance Multiplier.
CBS believes this made it clear that “[t]he precise amount of such bonus payment,
if any, will be determined on an annual basis and will depend on company and individual
performance.” The IPM for Swain was zero percent.
Swain contested this, leading Paul Hastings LLP attorneys in New York and Washington, D.C., to build Paramount’s defense against her formal civil complaint, submitted to the Maryland federal district court in February 2024.
By August 2025, a motion for summary judgment from Paramount was submitted to Judge Stephanie Gallagher. On Wednesday, she gave her opinion, denying the employment discrimination claims presented by Swain. In short, Gallagher sided with Paramount that any bonus payments were discretionary.
Gallagher also rejected Swain’s claim that she was terminated in retaliation for making complaints about unlawful activity relating to AudNet, a sales platform used by CBS.
