Tag: Bill O’Reilly

Oh gosh gee what do we have here:

A woman who reached a settlement with Bill O’Reilly over harassment allegations sued Mr. O’Reilly and Fox News on Monday for defamation and breach of contract, saying that public statements he and the network made violated the settlement and portrayed her as a liar and politically motivated extortionist.

The woman, Rachel Witlieb Bernstein, is one of six known to have reached settlements after making accusations against Mr. O’Reilly. (Her allegations did not include sexual harassment.) None of the others have said anything publicly about their claims, which involved sexual harassment.

Mr. O’Reilly has repeatedly said that the harassment allegations that led to his ouster from Fox News in April have no merit, that he never mistreated anyone and that he resolved the matters privately to protect his children.

Nope, says the lawsuit, it’s O’Reilly who’s the liar here.

Settlements involving harassment allegations often contain strict confidentiality and nondisparagement clauses, which some employment lawyers have said build a culture of silence around these issues and allow misconduct to continue.

Some? Not all? Of course nondisparagement clauses build a culture of silence around these issues and allow misconduct to continue; how could they possibly do anything else?

Ms. Bernstein’s lawyers, Neil Mullin and Nancy Erika Smith, have been vocal critics of the use of nondisclosure agreements and nondisparagement clauses to silence victims of harassment…

“Knowing Ms. Bernstein and Mr. O’Reilly’s other victims are afraid to speak out because he and Fox forced them to sign nondisclosure agreements, O’Reilly and Fox have made false and disparaging claims,” Mr. Mullin said in a statement. “They should release all victims from their NDAs and let the truth out. It is cowardly to publicly attack these women knowing they have been subjected to contractual provisions requiring absolute silence.”

Cowardly and shitty and harassy.

Here’s a stunning item I missed a few days ago: Bill O’Reilly’s contract with Fox

contained a helpful provision stating that he “could not be dismissed on the basis of an allegation unless that allegation was proved in court.” The revelation stems from a proceeding of Britain’s Competition & Markets Authority (CMA), which is reviewing a bid by Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox to assert control of the portion of satellite TV outlet Sky that it doesn’t already own. As part of the review, Jacques Nasser, a director of 21st Century Fox, gave testimony on the company’s inner workings.

And what astonishing workings: As Nasser told the story, there was a quick reaction to the accusations against former Fox News chief Roger Ailes, who was sued by former Fox News host Gretchen Carlson in July 2016. After a review of Ailes’s conduct, he was quickly ousted.

But BillO? Not so much.

Such a lightning response, however, wasn’t possible in the case of O’Reilly, Nasser told CMA, because of O’Reilly’s contract. Requiring sexual-harassment allegations to be proved in a court of law before dismissing the accused party — that’s a steep requirement. Analyses have shown that well above 90 percent of all civil cases are settled or dismissed before they reach a trial. Not only that, but a wealthy man like O’Reilly can use his assets to ensure that he’d never face a proven claim of sexual harassment.

It seems it was only because there were so many, and because word got out, and because 21st Century Fox got involved, and because there was a new contract, that Fox News was finally able to fire him.

As the New York Times reported in April, there were at least five settlements involving O’Reilly’s treatment of women, and several of them were negotiated directly between O’Reilly and the accuser. Those revelations triggered calls for action against O’Reilly advertisers, and the pressure forced Fox News to fire O’Reilly. The story stood right there for months, until the New York Times revealed last month that O’Reilly had in January agreed to another, astounding settlement with legal analyst Lis Wiehl for the sum of $32 million. Though O’Reilly’s bosses were aware of the Wiehl accusation, they were kept in the dark about the settlement amount. They re-upped with the newsman anyhow, in a four-year deal that paid him $25 million per year.

In response to that story, 21st Century Fox issued a statement saying, in part, “His new contract, which was made at a time typical for renewals of multi-year talent contracts, added protections for the company specifically aimed at harassment, including that Mr. O’Reilly could be dismissed if the company was made aware of other allegations or if additional relevant information was obtained in a company investigation.” In his remarks to the CMA, Nasser confirmed that “a clause was inserted to state that he could be dismissed on the grounds of an allegation against him without it having to be proved in court,” according to the summary provided by the CMA. From the looks of things, the contract that contained the court-proof provision was negotiated between Team O’Reilly and Fox News; the 2017 version was negotiated with greater input from 21st Century Fox.

It’s interesting to try to imagine how that discussion went.

That O’Reilly ever had a prove-it-in-court provision says a great deal about: 1) His lawyers, who knew how to protect him; 2) Fox News, which should have seen the provision as fair warning and a potential legal liability: “Fox lawyers and executives knew that this was a big issue if they were signing a contract with him with this type of provision,” says Banks; 3) The ways in which the legal system accommodates rich people; as premier thinker Tom Scocca wrote, settlements are a “Get Out of Jail Free” card for accused sexual harassers such as O’Reilly. And to think: O’Reilly has bashed this very system for unduly empowering complainants to bring frivolous complaints against celebrities.

And 4) the malignant Fox News culture of ratings. With very few scoops and little in the way of journalistic integrity, Fox News has always fended off the attacks of critics by pointing to its preeminence in the ratings. As the Fox News sexual-harassment saga drags on, we learn more and more about how low its executives will stoop in order to preserve this distinction.

Item 2 is a killer. They knew. They accepted that clause, so they knew. “Ok, you’re a ratings magnet, so sure, we’ll let you creep on women and get away with it. Love ya, mean it.”

Megyn Kelly sent up a rocket on the subject of sexual harassment at Fox this morning. The Post did a transcript.

On Saturday, the Times revealed yet another settlement, paid to dispose of a sexual harassment case against O’Reilly. Not a huge shock there, we already knew of five, thanks to a Times report in April. But this latest one was for $32 million. Reportedly paid directly by O’Reilly to Fox News legal analyst Lis Wiehl, right before Fox News renewed his contract.

Thirty-two million dollars. That is not a nuisance value settlement, that is a jaw-dropping figure. O.J. Simpson was ordered to pay the Goldman and Brown families $33.5 million for the murders of Ron and Nicole. What on earth would justify that amount? What awfulness went on?…

…

O’Reilly calls the Times reports a malicious smear, claiming that no woman in 20 years ever complained to human resources or legal about him.

Maybe that is true. Fox News was not exactly a friendly environment for harassment victims who wanted to report, in my experience. However, O’Reilly’s suggestion that no one ever complained about his behavior is false — I know because I complained. It was November of 2016, the day my memoir was released. In it, I included a chapter on Ailes and the sexual harassment scandal at Fox News — something the Murdochs knew I was doing and, to their credit, approved.

O’Reilly was being interviewed on CBS News that day and he brushed aside questions about sexual abuse at Fox. So Kelly wrote to the co-presidents of Fox.

…an email I have never made public but am sharing now because I think it speaks volumes about powerful men and the roadblocks one can face in taking them on.

I wrote, in part, “Perhaps he didn’t realize the kind of message his criticism sends to young women across this country, about how men continue to view the issue of speaking out about sexual harassment. Perhaps he didn’t realize that his exact attitude of shaming women into shutting the hell up about harassment on grounds that it will disgrace the company is part of how Fox News got into the decade-long Ailes mess to begin with.

Perhaps it’s his own history of harassment of women, which has, as you both know, resulted in payouts to more than one woman, including recently. That blinded him to the folly of saying anything other than ‘I am just so sorry for the women of this company, who never should have had to go through that.’ ”

Bill Shine called me in response to my email, promising to deal with O’Reilly. By 8 p.m. that night, O’Reilly had apparently been dealt with. And by that, I mean he was permitted, with management’s advance notice and blessing, to go on the air and attack the company’s harassment victims yet again.

Oh that kind of “dealt with.”

That was the one where he said if you don’t like being sexually abused at work then quit.

This is not unique to Fox News. Women everywhere are used to being dismissed, ignored or attacked when raising complaints about men in authority positions. They stay silent so often out of fear. Fear of ending their careers. Fear of lawyers, yes. And often fear of public shaming, including through the media.

At Fox News, the media relations chief Irena Briganti is known for her vindictiveness. To this day, she pushes negative articles on certain Ailes accusers, like the one you are looking at right now. It gives me no pleasure to report such news about my former employer, which has absolutely made some reforms since all of this went down. But this must stop. The abuse of women, the shaming of them, the threatening and the retaliation, silencing of them after the fact, it has to stop.

It has to, but will it?

Courtney Martin has experience of doing O’Reilly’s horrible show.

I was in my late 20s and headed to The O’Reilly Factor to defend now-deceased journalist Helen Thomas. O’Reilly had referred to her as the “Wicked Witch of the East,” and I was joining the show to argue that the most veteran White House correspondent (she covered 10 presidencies) should be evaluated on the basis of her reporting — not on her appearance or age.

Political correctness run riot! Victimhood! Snowflake! Of course women should be attacked for being old and ugly; it makes them stronger! Old ugly women should be thanking people like O’Reilly for this quick and easy strengthening exercise.

She got the makeup and hair treatment and they sat her down on the set.

O’Reilly walked in a few moments later; sat down in his chair, which was raised several inches above all the others; swiveled toward me; and without so much as a hello, barked, “Do you even know what you’re here to talk about?”

Ah his chair was raised. Of course it was. I’ve always hated the way he looms over people and shouts them down, but I never watched him enough to figure out that his chair was higher. Doesn’t that just stand for the whole thing – the bully ethos writ large.

Though I’d written multiple books by then, my chyron simply read “Feminist” — a telling sign in and of itself as to what O’Reilly and his team thought about my credentials. In their world, either you’re an old hag, like Helen Thomas, or you’re a rabid feminist, like me. None of our actual work meant shit inside of O’Reilly’s studio. Our value was our capacity to fill roles in his own bizarro world of extremes, not our knowledge or experience (as expertise is actually defined). Caricature is at the core of conservative media’s operating model; lure people like me on with the allure of five seconds of fame and a false sense of righteousness, and you’ve got yourself “good television.” Problem is, such “good television” creates hateful citizens. Real viewers saw the real world through O’Reilly’s notoriously reductive lens.

Did and still do.

She paid a price, of course.

When I got back to my apartment that night and opened my laptop, my jaw dropped at the number of new emails in my inbox. I’d never seen anything like it — email after email, hundreds over a few days, referring to me in every single sexist term you can imagine (and some you probably can’t). To make things really meta, the majority of them attacked my appearance…When I was getting my makeup done before the show started, I had chatted with the producer a bit, realizing that we had gone to the same high school back in Colorado Springs. So when the flood of misogyny came, I thought I’d let him know. He seemed like a decent guy. His response? In a nutshell: “That’s horrible. We would never condone that kind of behavior.”

Condone? That would be timid. How about model and fuel? And, of course, now we know that O’Reilly wasn’t just modeling on-air, but behind the scenes, too.

Assholes gonna asshole.

Which is to say, The O’Reilly Factor wasn’t a performance. No matter how much conservative pundits (and probably a few liberal ones) would like to believe they are just “putting on a show” for their viewers, there are real consequences. Hearts and minds are shaped. Citizens are influenced…Is it any wonder that a reality television star was elected president when so many Americans have grown accustomed to watching bullies reduce people to types and fan the flames of fear every night on the news?

Is it any wonder a bully was elected president when so many Americans have grown accustomed to admiring bullies? No, it’s not.

This became famous among the infidels because of BillO’s absurd “the tide comes in, the tide goes out, you can’t explain that,” but it’s interesting from the first few seconds because of the way he won’t let Dave utter even one complete sentence even though Dave’s the invited guest and he’s answering BillO’s question. This is why I’ve always loathed O’Reilly: the bullying.

Ok, the Times is reporting it now, not as “reportedly.” That vile loudmouth bully is out.

Bill O’Reilly has been forced out of his position as a prime-time host on Fox News, the company said on Wednesday, after the disclosure of multiple settlements involving sexual harassment allegations against him. His ouster brings an abrupt and embarrassing end to his two-decade reign as one of the most popular and influential commentators in television.

“After a thorough and careful review of the allegations, the company and Bill O’Reilly have agreed that Bill O’Reilly will not be returning to the Fox News Channel,” 21st Century Fox, Fox News’s parent company, said in a statement.

That is, the company told him.

Mr. O’Reilly’s departure comes two and a half weeks after an investigation by The New York Times revealed how Fox News and 21st Century Fox had repeatedly stood by Mr. O’Reilly even as sexual harassment allegations piled up against him. The Times found that the company and Mr. O’Reilly reached settlements with five women who had complained about sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior by him. The agreements totaled about $13 million.

Since then, more than 50 advertisers had abandoned his show, and women’s rights groups called for his ouster. Inside the company, women expressed outrage and questioned whether top executives were serious about maintaining a culture based on “trust and respect,” as they had promised last summer when another sexual harassment scandal forced the ouster of Fox News’s chairman, Roger Ailes.

The pussygrabber is still in the White House though.

Mr. O’Reilly, 67, has been an anchor at Fox News since he started at the network in 1996. He was the top-rated host in cable news, serving up defiant commentary every weekday at 8 p.m., with a message that celebrated patriotism and expressed scorn for political correctness.

In other words, he’s an asshole, and has spread his brand of assholishness all over the country.

So long Bill.

Here’s what Gabriel Sherman at New York mag has about O’Reilly’s purportedly imminent expulsion (isn’t that a nice triplet of latinate words?):

The Murdochs have decided Bill O’Reilly’s 21-year run at Fox News will come to an end. According to sources briefed on the discussions, network executives are preparing to announce O’Reilly’s departure before he returns from an Italian vacation on April 24. Now the big questions are how the exit will look and who will replace him.

Wednesday morning, according to sources, executives are holding emergency meetings to discuss how they can sever the relationship with the country’s highest-rated cable-news host without causing collateral damage to the network. The board of Fox News’ parent company, 21st Century Fox, is scheduled to meet on Thursday to discuss the matter.

So they’re discussing how to prevent O’Reilly from taking them down with him? Or at least doing what he can to share his mud with them?

Good luck with that, fellas. He’s your guy; he’s done a lot to ruin the country; you reap what you fucking sow.

Sources briefed on the discussions say O’Reilly’s exit negotiations are moving quickly. Right now, a key issue on the table is whether he would be allowed to say good-bye to his audience, perhaps the most loyal in all of cable (O’Reilly’s ratings have ticked up during the sexual-harassment allegations). Fox executives are leaning against allowing him to have a sign-off, sources say.

Aww. It’s so sweet that he wants to say good-bye. Maybe he’s a nice guy after all.

The other thing they’re talking about is the money. He just signed a new contract for over $20 million year for X [NY doesn’t say] years – will they have to pay him the whole 20 x X? I hope they do, and then go bankrupt, while he blows it all over a weekend in Vegas.

The Murdochs’ decision to dump O’Reilly shocked many Fox News staffers I’ve spoken to in recent days.

And no wonder. It’s only women, after all – who cares?

Bill O’Reilly may or may not be out. The Washington Post says he reportedly is, which means it’s hedging.

According to a New York magazine report Wednesday, O’Reilly is being forced out.

Is being…so it’s a process so it’s not being reported as a fait accompli yet.

A once-unthinkable move had begun to seem inevitable. Multiple news outlets, including the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal, reported Tuesday night that Fox News was preparing to sack the King of Cable News, as advertisers fled his top-rated program in response to a New York Times report that O’Reilly and the network have paid $13 million to five women over the years to settle claims of sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct. Murdoch also owns Fox News.

Earlier Tuesday, attorney Lisa Bloom said she had taken the case of a sixth woman who claims O’Reilly sexually harassed her.

Fox still has top ratings, and O’Reilly still has top of the top – but oh guess what, top ratings don’t do you a bit of good if advertisers won’t touch you. The entire point of high ratings is that they command top advertising dollar. If the ad dollars=no not at any price, ratings become meaningless.

There’s also, Callum Borchers says, the intangible of reputation or image.

Besides principles of right and wrong, which are not always paramount in business, there was Fox News’s brand image to consider. Sexual harassment allegations pushed out Ailes, and with similar accusations dogging O’Reilly, the network appeared hostile to women.

A company’s reputation is a difficult thing to quantify, but consider this, from the Department of Anecdotal Evidence: As of Monday, the Fox affiliate in Boston, the nation’s ninth-largest media market, will change the name of its local newscast from “Fox 25 News” to “Boston 25 News” because it considers the Fox brand a liability.

My first thought about Fox would be that it doesn’t give a flying fuck about image, not even brand image – but my second is that if brand image is causing advertisers to flee, then of course yes it does.

It would be nice to think the toppling of BillO means the beginning of a wave of male bullies being pushed out of the corridors of power…but it’s not going to happen.

Bill O’Reilly is hemorrhaging advertisers. Something about not wanting to promote a serial sexual harasser, apparently.

At least nine more marketers said they were withdrawing ads from “The O’Reilly Factor,” making a total of at least 11 that have suspended their sponsorship in the last 24 hours. Mercedes-Benz and Hyundai announced their decisions Monday night, and on Tuesday they were joined by BMW of North America; GlaxoSmithKline; T. Rowe Price; Mitsubishi; Allstate; Bayer; Constant Contact, an online marketer; Untuckit, a men’s clothing distributor; and Sanofi Consumer HealthCare, which advertised products like ACT mouthwash on Mr. O’Reilly’s show.

Mouthwash. Too much like those Tic-Tacs that Trump popped because he wanted to grab that one woman and kiss her without asking first.

The decisions came after The New York Times published an investigation last weekend that found that five women who had accused Mr. O’Reilly of sexual harassment or inappropriate behavior received settlements totaling about $13 million.

Yes but Hillary! Emails!! Susan Rice!!!

Also on Tuesday, the legal troubles for Fox News continued. Monica Douglas, a black Fox News employee, joined a lawsuit that was filed last week against Fox News by two other women, asserting that they were subjected to racial harassment at the network. The suit was filed in State Supreme Court in the Bronx. Fox News dismissed the executive named in the suit, Judith Slater, the longtime controller, on Feb. 28. It said in a statement “there is no place for conduct like this at Fox News, which is why Ms. Slater was fired.”

Racism at Fox News?! I’m flabbergasted!