Megyn Kelly on Bill O'Reilly: Abuse, shaming of women has to stop
NEW YORK -- Former Fox News Channel anchor Megyn Kelly says she complained to her bosses about Bill O'Reilly's behavior after she had accused former Fox chief Roger Ailes of sexual harassment, and that the abuse and shaming of women has to stop.
Kelly, now on NBC, spoke Monday after it was revealed in The New York Times that Fox paid a $32 million settlement to former Fox analyst Lis Wiehl shortly before O'Reilly's contract was renewed in February. CBS News has not confirmed the amount of the settlement.
"When the company renewed Bill O'Reilly's contract in February, it knew that a sexual harassment lawsuit had been threatened against him by Lis Wiehl, but was informed by Mr. O'Reilly that he had settled the matter personally, on financial terms that he and Ms. Wiehl had agreed were confidential and not disclosed to the company," 21st Century Fox said in a statement to CBS News on Saturday.
O'Reilly denied doing anything improper in an interview with the Times. He was subsequently fired in April.
When Kelly's memoir was released last November, O'Reilly publicly questioned the loyalty of those who criticized Fox.
She said on NBC that "the abuse of women, the shaming of them, the threatening, the retaliation, the silencing of them after the fact — it has to stop."
In an interview with one-time colleague Glenn Beck on Monday, O'Reilly that it was "incomprehensible" that Kelly would speak out against him, saying that "I helped her dramatically" in her career.
He posted online an undated thank-you note Kelly had written to him for giving a gift at a baby shower.