O'Reilly renewed attacks on columnists Hernandez and Rodriguez; claimed Hernandez is “incompetent” and a “Latina ideologue”

On the November 2 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, host Bill O'Reilly once again falsely attacked columnists Macarena Hernandez of The Dallas Morning News and Cindy Rodriguez of The Denver Post, accusing them repeatedly of lying. “Hernandez basically attacked me and the Fox News Channel and The Radio Factor for demonizing undocumented workers from Mexico,” he said. “That's a total lie. You know, and she doesn't have anything. She took it from a left-wing website,” he added, in an apparent reference to Media Matters for America. He went on to say:

O'REILLY: [T]he woman [Hernandez] is incompetent all day long. I mean, she shouldn't be writing for anything. She's just a Latina ideologue who spits stuff that she gets off the internet. But The Dallas Morning News printed it. Now The Dallas Morning News is big enough that I gotta take them on. And then her partner in arms, Cindy Rodriguez over at The Denver Post, says the same nonsense. And just lies, flat-out lies.

O'Reilly's assertions are the latest in a continuing series of false accusations against Hernandez and Rodriguez. In an October 15 column condemning anti-immigrant violence, Hernandez criticized O'Reilly for comments he made during the April 15 broadcast of The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly. As Media Matters reported at the time, O'Reilly agreed with a caller who claimed that each undocumented immigrant who enters the United States is a “biological weapon.” O'Reilly added, “I think you could probably make an absolutely airtight case that more than 3,000 Americans have been either killed or injured, based upon the 11 million illegals who are here.” O'Reilly has misleadingly denied that he ever made such comments and repeatedly criticized Hernandez. He also condemned Media Matters as “where she [Hernandez] got her garbage.”

Rodriguez defended Hernandez in an October 25 column and further criticized O'Reilly's April 15 remarks. O'Reilly responded by again deceptively denying that he made such comments, dismissing criticism of his remarks as “insane.” O'Reilly has also falsely suggested that Hernandez and Rodriguez support open borders; but as Media Matters has noted, neither has written anything of the sort in their columns.

From the November 2 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly:

O'REILLY: I mean, every day I have to deal with insane things that are said about me and the Fox News Channel. And I just can't run them all down for you. Most of them we ignore.

But occasionally, we'll take on somebody who is just grossly irresponsible. And the best example of that is a week or so ago where The Dallas Morning News columnist Macarena Hernandez basically attacked me and the Fox News Channel and The Radio Factor for demonizing undocumented workers from Mexico. That's a total lie. You know, and she doesn't have anything. She took it from a left-wing website. She didn't even know the difference between the radio and television show.

I mean, the woman is an incompetent all day long. I mean, she shouldn't be writing for anything. She doesn't know what she's doing. She's not a journalist. She's just a Latina ideologue who spits out stuff that she gets off the internet. But The Dallas Morning News printed it. Now The Dallas Morning News is big enough that I gotta take them on. And then her partner in arms, Cindy Rodriguez over at The Denver Post, says the same nonsense. And just lies, flat-out lies.