On the September 21 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio show, Fox News host Bill O'Reilly falsely attributed President Bush's 2004 election victory to independent voters, marking the third time he has made this claim. O'Reilly asserted that “Bush won by three million votes. And they were independent voters.” Media Matters for America has twice corrected previous claims by O'Reilly that Bush prevailed among independent voters (here and here). In both instances, Media Matters pointed out that exit polling shows that Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) narrowly won independents, carrying them at 49 percent to Bush's 48 percent. Bush's victory was instead sealed through his 93 percent share of the Republican vote.

From the September 21 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly:

O'REILLY: You're not going to get an analysis like this anywhere else. President Bush was re-elected last November. OK? Almost 11 months ago. Because Americans gave him the benefit of the doubt. They didn't give the benefit of the doubt to Kerry. So you had two guys, and both had fairly substantial downsides to non-ideological people. You know, the Kool-Aid drinkers on both sides are going to vote for their guy, no matter what. They don't care. But the independents who swung the investigation of Bush basically gave him the benefit of the doubt. They liked how he reacted after 9-11. They liked his strong war-on-terrorists stance. And they said, well, maybe Iraq isn't going the way we wanted it to go, but we have confidence in him to pull it out. That's exactly what happened, and Bush won by three million votes. And they were independent voters. OK?