In Kalanick's place, I would do the exact same thing regardless of whether the claims were valid.

2 years after a jury found that Ellen Pao was full of it, TechCrunch and other media still portrays her as a victim. Most likely they will do the same for Susan Fowler, even if (purely hypothetically) a court finds her to be full of it.

https://techcrunch.com/2017/02/20/uber-is-not-the-only-tech-...

In such a media climate, you need to genuflect in the direction of all that the masses find holy regardless of the facts. At least if you are good at politics, which Uber is.