Fox News parts with TV host Bill O’Reilly
Sexual harassment allegations hound conservative host
Conservative-leaning commentator leaves network after nearly two decades, and a string of sexual harassment complaints.
viewers. I wish only the best for Fox News Channel.”
O’Reilly, 67, lost his job on the same day he was photographed at the Vatican shaking the hand of Pope Francis.
The host of “The O’Reilly Factor” got the news of his dismissal while awaiting a flight back to the U.S. from his vacation in Italy. His representatives said he was “resigned” to his demise, having monitored negotiations over his exit for the past several days.
O’Reilly wasn’t directly involved in the discussions with the family of Rupert Murdoch, which controls Fox and 21st Century Fox; his attorney, Fred Newman, conducted the talks.
People close to O’Reilly said Murdoch and his sons, James and Lachlan, who head 21st Century, effectively decided O’Reilly’s fate. O’Reilly’s contract, signed last month, contains a clause that enables him to be dismissed under a fixed financial formula, averting protracted negotiations.
Fox said conservative pundit Tucker Carlson would move into O’Reilly’s time slot — the second time in three months he’s replaced an exiting primetime personality. The veteran Carlson, who has hosted shows on CNN, MSNBC and PBS, had taken over for Megyn Kelly in January when she announced she wasmoving to NBC News.
O’Reilly had ruled the “no spin zone” on television with a quick smile and an even quicker temper. He pushed a populist, conservative-point of view and was quick to shout down those who disagreed with him.
The end for O’Reilly was set in motion by a New York Times investigation in early April that revealed that he and Fox had settled five allegations of harassment brought by Fox employees over a 15-year period. The company and O’Reilly paid out $13 million in exchange for his accusers’ silence.
The Murdochs were aware of the allegations against O’Reilly when they re-signed their star commentator to a three-year contract that pays him about $18 million a year. In preparing their article, reporters for The New York Times had sent Fox’s executives a list of questions, placing senior executives on alert months in advance of its publication.
But the prospect that his accusers — bound by nondisclosure agreements as a result of their settlements — wouldn’t speak in anything but general terms led the company to believe it could weather the article.
Itwas a sixth accuser— a former guest on O’Reilly’s program named Wendy Walsh — who may have been the key to his unraveling. Unlike the women who received settlements for their complaints, Walsh never sued or settled with O’Reilly, leaving her free to speak publicly about her harassment allegations. She did so repeatedly, putting a name, face and voice to the claims in media accounts.
Shortly after the Times published its article, advertisers began to flee O’Reilly’s program. That continued as Walsh gave interviews. On Tuesday, another woman came forward, anonymously, to complain that she had been harassed with racial and sexual comments by O’Reilly in 2008.
The Murdochs concluded that O’Reilly was vulnerable to further complaints and that the continuing publicity would make him untenable in advertisers’ eyes.
His show generated $178 million in advertising revenue in 2015, according to Kantar Media. Before the advertising boycott, there was the prospect of even more: His audience was larger in the first three months of 2017 than it has ever been. With a profit center gone, 21st Century Fox stock fell almost 1 percent Wednesday in heavy trading.
Even an endorsement from President Donald Trump could not save O’Reilly: In an interview with Times reporters April 5, Trump called O’Reilly “a good person” and said he should not have settled the complaints made against him. “I don’t think Bill did anything wrong,” Trump said.
O’Reilly hasn’t said what he intends to do next.