According to a September 20 ABC News Online article promoting an upcoming appearance of Fox News host Bill O'Reilly on ABC's 20/20 to promote his new book Culture Warrior (Broadway, September 2006), O'Reilly stated that he receives “death threats on a daily basis,” and that it's “a little disconcerting” that “the FBI came in and warned me and a few other people at Fox News that al Qaeda had us on a death list.” But O'Reilly's claim to be on an Al Qaeda “death list” has reportedly been disputed by an FBI official and a “correspondent” at Fox News.

A federal law enforcement officer reportedly told the website Radar that he is “not aware of any FBI agents warning anyone at Fox News of their presence on any list” and that he is “not aware of any Al Qaeda hit list targeting journalists.” Radar also noted that one “correspondent” at Fox News said that “neither he nor anyone he's spoken to at the network has been warned by the FBI,” and that “the government has warned Fox about threats in the past, but I don't think they involved specific people.” Radar also reported said that Fox News media relations director Leah Yoon stated that the network had “nothing to say” about O'Reilly's assertion, because "[w]e shouldn't be shouldering the burden of something he said on someone else's network."

From the September 20 article on ABC News Online:

O'Reilly says his fame and success -- and sometimes controversial views -- have come with a price.

“With the controversy comes death threats on a daily basis,” O'Reilly said. “Not only from kooks. But the FBI came in and warned me and a few other people at Fox News that al Qaeda had us on a death list. ... That's a little disconcerting.”

From Radar:

Bill O'Reilly may be the most fervent flag waver on cable -- a patriot who believes in torturing terrorists and profiling all Muslims. But is that enough to get him targeted by Al Qaeda?

The loofah-loving Fox News host is raising plenty of eyebrows around the office after telling Barbara Walters in an interview with ABC's 20/20 that, “the FBI came in and warned me and a few other people at Fox News that Al Qaeda had us on a death list.” O'Reilly describes the experience -- as well as other violent threats he says he's received from various “kooks” -- as “disconcerting.”

But the reaction from some of his colleagues sounds more like disbelief. “I've never heard that before,” says a correspondent for Fox News, who added that neither he nor anyone he's spoken to at the network has been warned by the FBI. “I do know the government has warned Fox about threats in the past, but I don't think they involved specific people.”

A high-level exec at another cable news channel was less circumspect. “That sounds like absolute bullshit to me -- it's typical O'Reilly,” he says. “We've never received any similar warnings from the FBI or any other government agency, and we've done plenty of reporting to piss off Bin Laden.”

UPDATE: A skeptical federal law enforcement official contacted Radar this morning: “I'm not aware of any FBI agents warning anyone at Fox News of their presence on any list. ... For that matter, I'm not aware of any Al Qaeda hit list targeting journalists. Agents from the D.C. field office, FBI headquarters, and an agent from the kidnapping unit went to Fox's offices in New York last month to advise them specifically on the Gaza kidnapping [of Fox employees Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig]. But they only talked to management, they didn't talk to any individual journalists.”

Spokepeople [sic] at CBS News and ABC News also said their networks had not received warnings. Although a spokesman for the FBI did not immediately return calls, an official at the agency's New York City office said she had never heard of the bureau issuing the caveat. “I'm not aware of that,” she said.

Asked about O'Reilly's claim, Fox News' reaction was equally confounding. Media relations director Leah Yoon repeatedly insisted the network had “nothing to say,” because O'Reilly's interview is being aired on ABC.

“We shouldn't be shouldering the burden of something he said on someone else's network,” she said.