[2][5] Later, he was co-president and co-chief operating officer (COO) of the original Viacom, the legal predecessor to CBS Corporation, from 2004 until the company split in December 2005.

[6][7][8] In September 2018, Moonves stepped down as chairman of CBS after multiple women brought forth sexual assault allegations against him.

[16] In his sophomore year, he decided that his science courses were unfulfilling and switched his major from pre-medical to the Spanish language (a subject he found vastly more enjoyable) and acted in a few plays; following graduation in 1971 he moved to Manhattan to pursue an acting career where he eventually graduated from the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre.

[35] Following his firing from CBS due to sexual harassment, Moonves was revealed to have been obsessed with ruining R&B singer-songwriter Janet Jackson's career.

Jackson's right breast, adorned with a pierced nipple shield (with a silver sun), had been exposed by ex-NSYNC member, vocalist Justin Timberlake, for 9/16ths of a second.

[38] Jackson had been scheduled to attend the 46th Annual Grammy Awards where she was to perform a tribute to Luther Vandross, after collaborating with him on the #1 single "The Best Things in Life Are Free", which was created for the soundtrack to the 1992 film Mo' Money.

[45]) Moonves allegedly asked fellow CBS executives if the corporation could compel Jackson to pay the FCC fines following the investigation of the halftime show incident by Congress.

[36] In February 2006, Moonves led CBS to file a $500 million lawsuit against Howard Stern for allegedly breaching his contract by failing to disclose the details of his deal with Sirius Satellite Radio while still employed by Infinity Broadcasting.

Stern vowed to fight the suit, and said on his radio program that Moonves and CBS were trying to "bully" him and his agent, Don Buchwald.

Stern later appeared on CBS's own Late Show with David Letterman, wearing a shirt mocking Moonves and his wife.

As part of the settlement, Sirius acquired the exclusive rights to all of the WXRK tapes (over two decades' worth of shows) for $2 million.

[47] Moonves's personal investment[48] in the company has been noted, as well as his appearances at several launch parties, including for Bethesda Softworks' Fallout 3, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and Rage.

[49] Moonves voiced support for the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment in the workplace,[50][51] even describing it as a "watershed moment" during a November 2017 press conference,[52] and was a founding member of the Commission on Sexual Harassment and Advancing Equality in the Workplace, formed in late 2017 to "tackle the broad culture of abuse and power disparity".

[55][56][57] In July 2018, The New Yorker published an article by Ronan Farrow saying that six women accused Moonves of harassment and intimidation, and dozens have described abuse at CBS.

[61] Shortly after resigning as CEO of CBS that month, Moonves released a statement denying all of the sexual misconduct allegations.

[63] The next month, it was revealed Moonves had been involved in paying a $9.5 million settlement to actress Eliza Dushku, who claimed she was written out of her starring role on CBS drama Bull as retaliation for reporting sexual harassment by co-star Michael Weatherly; actress Cybill Shepherd alleged in a radio interview that Moonves cancelled her sitcom, Cybill, after she rejected his advances.

[64][66][67][68][69] On June 21, 2019, advice columnist E. Jean Carroll wrote in a first-person essay in New York that Moonves sexually assaulted her in an elevator in the mid-1990s after she interviewed him for a story.

[71] On February 8, 2019, The New York Times reported that Moonves had founded his own company in West Hollywood, California named Moon Rise Unlimited after being fired from CBS.

Letterman jokingly warned the "CBS stooge in the control room" to call his buddies "before things turn ugly"; Moonves obliged.

[78] In April 2003, Nancy Moonves filed for divorce in Los Angeles Superior Court, citing irreconcilable differences.

[79] While still married to Nancy, Moonves began dating Julie Chen, CBS's The Early Show reporter and host of the reality series Big Brother and The Talk.

[80] On December 10, 2004, Moonves got a court to grant an early divorce,[81] on a motion citing a "desire to return to the status of being single".

[87] In August 2018, Moonves was "suspended" from the USC School of Cinematic Arts' board of councilors in the wake of sex abuse allegations.