Fox News host Bill O'Reilly accused Media Matters Monday night of calling him a “racist” following his February 2011 pre-Super Bowl interview with President Obama. O'Reilly claimed that when, during the interview, he asked Obama " 'are you a football guy, do you follow football?' I was immediately branded a racist by Media Matters, because I was saying -- I was asking him whether he followed football or not. How am I supposed to know? You know, that was a racist question."

Guest and Fox News contributor Bernard Goldberg replied: “Yeah, I know. I remember.”

In fact, we have not “branded” O'Reilly -- or anyone -- a “racist.” A search of our website for the combination "Obama basketball O'Reilly" or "O'Reilly football Obama" yields references that have nothing to do with O'Reilly's sports-related question to Obama during the pre-Super Bowl interview.

At the time, we posted seven items about the interview; none mentioned or even referred to O'Reilly's football question -- and none “branded” him a “racist.”

Those items include:

• O'Reilly Marks Day Three Of Obama Interview Celebration By Hosting Ingraham To Help Him Revel In Glory

• O'Reilly's Officially In Denial About Fox News' “Crusade” Against Obama

• Unforced Error: Obama's O'Reilly Interview

• O'Reilly's Obama Interview Just 53 Million Viewers Short Of TV Record

• O'Reilly Hosts Juan Williams And Mary Katharine Ham To Gush Over His Super Bowl Interview With President Obama

• No, Fox, Obama Didn't Take Credit For Bush's Tax Cuts

• Fox Corporate Pitches Presidential Interview As “Obama vs. O'Reilly”

Here is the exchange in question, which began when O'Reilly asked Obama whether he was going to sit and watch the Super Bowl. From a Politics Daily transcript of the interview:

O'REILLY: Are you going to sit and you're going to watch?

OBAMA: I'm not going to --

O'REILLY: You know, like, football, you know, like, blitzes and coverage and all that?

OBAMA: Oh, I know football, man.

O'REILLY: You do?

OBAMA: Absolutely.

O'REILLY: I know you're a basketball guy.

OBAMA: I know football.

O'REILLY: Yes?

OBAMA: I know football and I will watch the game. What happens is I schmooze with everybody when they come.

O'REILLY: Yes?

OBAMA: Give them a little bit of time. But once the game starts, they can just sit and watch the game.

O'REILLY: And you're out there?

OBAMA: Well, no, I'll be sitting there with them, but I don't want them coming up chitting and chatting.

O'REILLY: All right.

A week after the interview aired, O'Reilly accused the “far left” of having “branded” the interview “racist.” On the February 14, 2011, edition of his show, O'Reilly said: “It was fascinating to see the reaction to my interview with President Obama on Super Bowl Sunday. But I must say, I never expected the interview to be branded racist. But on HBO, it was.”

He then aired a clip from HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher during which guest Hooman Majd, an Iranian-American journalist, called the question "bigoted." Indeed, on the February 11, 2011, edition of Real Time, Majd stated that O'Reilly asking Obama “if he knows football” “was actually bigoted.” Majd added: “I mean, if I was the president, I'd say get the f*** out of my house.”

Media Matters has been a frequent target of O'Reilly's. He has accused us, incorrectly, of deceptively editing him and has repeatedly branded us “fascists.”

* The headline on this post has been changed from the original version.