Bill O’Reilly, a disgraced talk-show host ousted from Fox News Channel over sexual harassment allegations, compared the series of sexual assault allegations made against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh to his own plight, which resulted in nearly $45 million in settlement payouts to his alleged victims and his de-listing from primetime cable news. (O’Reilly has since resurfaced at Newsmax, which produces internet-video television.)
In the last two weeks, Kavanaugh has been accused by multiple women of inappropriate and illegal sexual behavior toward them when he was young and intoxicated. On September 16, Christine Blasey Ford revealed herself as the author of a letter to Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., alleging that, at a high school party in the 1980s, Kavanaugh had pinned her down on a bed, tried to peel off her clothes, and covered her mouth when she tried to scream. On Sunday, it was reported that another Kavanaugh acquaintance, Deborah Ramirez, told The New Yorker that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her at a party and thrust his penis toward her face. This morning, Julie Swetnick accused Kavanaugh of being present at parties where women were drugged and “gang raped,” saying that she was among those who survived such a rape at a party where Kavanaugh was present. Kavanaugh has denied these accusations outright and stated that he is the victim of an “obvious character assassination.”
During an interview uploaded to the Newsmax TV YouTube channel, O’Reilly tells oddball right-wing radio host Wayne Allyn Root that allegations made against Kavanaugh are the byproduct of “a gender war” in America that had been set in motion by “the far-left.”
“If you are a man, you can be accused of misconduct and you’re guilty. You’re guilty. And if you defend yourself or defend others and believe that, for example, Brett Kavanaugh might be innocent, then you’re an abuser just for that belief,” O’Reilly said. “I mean, that’s really a brutal, brutal demolition of our basic right to presumption of innocence.”
Root questioned “when it ends,” asking at what point women will stop alleging that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted them. O’Reilly answered by comparing Kavanaugh to his own past as the subject of sexual assault allegations.
“Wayne, I went through this. It doesn’t end. It doesn’t end,” O’Reilly said. “I mean, I had some person say something about me. I never saw her in my life. OK? It’s the playbook. There’s a playbook. First, the accusation, you’ll get it into the press—we’ll give it to The New Yorker because we know The New Yorker is going to print it. They’re not going to check it. They’re going to print it. OK? Then everybody sees it, they print it, alright? Then, three days later we need another accusation. OK? So here it comes. Here’s another accusation.”
(Editor’s note: The New Yorker is legendary for its fastidious fact-checking.)
O’Reilly added, “So put yourself in Kavanaugh’s shoes. He’s emphatic that he didn’t do any of this when he was 17 years old and [later when he was] at Yale. So, on Thursday he gets a chance—but how demeaning.”
