Big payout for disgraced Fox News stalwart
UNITED STATES: Fox News’s former star personality, Bill O’reilly, will leave the network with the equivalent of a year’s salary, or US$25 million (NZ$35.7M), according to two people familiar with the settlement terms.
Parent company 21st Century Fox fired O’reilly, 67, after investigators retained by the company began reviewing allegations of sexual harassment and payouts to women who brought grievances against Fox News’s biggest star.
O’reilly’s ouster came just 18 days after disclosures of sexual harassment complaints and settlements by multiple women, and a call last week to Fox’s corporate hotline by Wendy Walsh, who alleged that O’reilly promised her a coveted spot appearing on his show but reneged after she refused to have sex with him.
O’reilly’s firing was an inglorious end to a spectacular career with Fox News. His opinion-based show The O’reilly Factor was a mainstay of the network’s primetime lineup, drawing an average of 4 million viewers an episode.
In recent months, O’reilly received a new employment agreement that stipulated that he would receive the equivalent of one year’s salary should he be forced out, according to the informed sources.
Fox also fired the architect of Fox News, Roger Ailes, after women complained that they were subjected to a hostile workplace and that Ailes suggested they provide sexual favours in exchange for career advancement. Ailes received a US$40M payout when he left.
Rupert Murdoch, the company’s co-chairman and controlling shareholder, initially wanted to keep O’reilly on the network but advertisers began bailing out of his programme.
Fox chief executive James Murdoch is said to have led the charge to dismiss O’reilly.
O’reilly maintains that the charges against him are untrue. His spokesman was not immediately available. - LA Times