O'Reilly: Like Iran, "the reason North Korea is causing trouble is that it wants to influence the November election"

On the October 9 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly claimed that "the reason North Korea is causing trouble" by allegedly developing and testing nuclear weapons "is that it wants to influence the November election." He added: "That is not a partisan statement. It is a fact," then concluded that North Korea "hate[s] Mr. Bush and want[s] to weaken him as much as possible."

As Media Matters for America has previously noted and as O'Reilly himself referenced, on the October 6 edition of The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly warned that "powerful forces want to influence your vote," and baselessly asserted that "Iran has ordered its killers to up the violence in Iraq for the next month" so that "Americans will hold President Bush responsible and vote in the Democrats, who the Iranians believe are not as aggressive in foreign policy."

From the October 9 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

O'REILLY: Now, the reason North Korea is causing trouble is that it wants to influence the November election. As we discussed last week, Iran's doing the same thing in Iraq -- ramping up the violence so Americans will turn against the Bush administration.

That is not a partisan statement. It is a fact. America's enemies are emboldened by the stalemate in Iraq and feel they can do anything they want to do. They also hate Mr. Bush and want to weaken him as much as possible.

—J.M.