O'Reilly falsely claims New Black Panthers said “they want to kill white babies” at polling place

Written by Kate Conway

Published

Bill O'Reilly falsely claimed that members of the New Black Panthers were “standing in front of a polling place and saying they want to kill white babies.” In fact, O'Reilly conflated two separate incidents: Video of a member of the New Black Panther Party suggesting the murder of babies is from a documentary produced prior to Election Day 2008.

O'Reilly's falsehood: New Black Panthers were “saying they want to kill white babies” at polling place

O'Reilly: New Black Panthers were “standing in front of a polling place and saying they want to kill white babies.” O'Reilly attacked the mainstream media for failing to cover the New Black Panthers case, which he described as “guys with batons standing in front of a polling place and saying they want to kill white babies.” From the July 23 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

O'REILLY: The establishment liberal media that you and I both talked about said, look, we don't like this tea party business. This could really amount to something, and it already has in places like Kentucky. So we don't like it -- and it's all primarily whites, so let's call them racists. Let's throw that charge out there, and there'll be a few nuts that help us with that. So that was established, all right.

So, then, conservative Americans or tea party supporters, whatever, they got angry about that. And then they started to look, all right, you know, OK, let's -- and then the Black Panthers show up. Oh, look at that. And then, as you pointed out, the media didn't cover that, and they're going, wait a minute, you're demonizing the tea party for being racist, but here we've got guys with batons standing in front of a polling place and saying they want to kill white babies, and you don't mention it.

FACT: Hate speech is from video produced prior to Election Day 2008 incident

Civil Rights Commission general counsel: “National Geographic Channel's documentary” was “produced in 2008, before the election.” In a video produced prior to Election Day 2008 -- not, as O'Reilly stated, in front of the polling place -- a member of the New Black Panther Party states, “You want freedom? You're going to have to kill some crackers. You're going to have to kill some of their babies.” During an April 23 hearing of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, David Blackwood, the commission's general counsel, introduced the video as evidence, including what he said was “the National Geographic Channel's documentary on the New Black Panther Party.” Blackwood said that the documentary was “produced in 2008, before the election.” From Blackwood's comments introducing video evidence to the commission:

BLACKWOOD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. What we're going to show in this next segment are three video clips that the Commission has obtained. The first -- and they will run one right after the other. The first is from the National Geographic Channel's documentary on the New Black Panther Party, which was obtained by subpoena.

The documentary was produced in 2008, before the election. It has background as to the New Black Panther Party. It shows clips of statements from Malik Zulu Shabazz, who is head of the party, and has footage and comments from the New Black Panther Party members who were at the Fairmount Street Polling Place: Minister King Samir Shabazz and Jerry Jackson.