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The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Amber Raiken

Bill O’Reilly is taking a step back from media appearances due to health issue

Bill O’Reilly is stepping back from the spotlight due to an unspecified illness.

The 76-year-old former news anchor, who now hosts the program No Spin News, shared the health update Tuesday on his blog. However, he didn’t disclose what was ailing him.

“Hey No Spin Nation. Sorry I am dealing with a malady,” he wrote. “We have great doctors so we’ll fight the good fight. Doesn’t affect my fingers so will update you on me, news cycle, and anything major. Hopefully, back in the saddle shortly.”

O’Reilly has been hosting No Spin News since 2017, shortly after he departed from Fox News. However, it is not clear when new episodes of the program, which airs every weeknight, will return, amid the anchor’s health issue.

The Independent has contacted a representative for O’Reilly for comment.

O’Reilly is also a frequent guest on NewsNation’s Cuomo. However, he was missing from his scheduled Tuesday appearance on the show.

“He is sick,” host Chris Cuomo said about O’Reilly’s absence. “He’ll be back soon.”

O’Reilly was fired from Fox News in April 2017, after hosting The O’Reilly Factor for more than 20 years. “After a thorough review of the allegations against him, the company and Bill O’Reilly have agreed that Mr O’Reilly will not return to the Fox News Channel,” an email to Fox News staff from its parent company, 21st Century Fox, read at the time.

A month before his firing, The New York Times reported that O’Reilly and Fox News had been obliged to pay out $13 million to settle claims against the anchor from five women. It was later reported that he made a $32 million agreement with a longtime network analyst to settle additional sexual harassment allegations.

However, O’Reilly denied the accusations at the time and has since continued to do so.

O’Reilly’s lawyer, Marc Kasowitz, hit back at the news anchor’s firing in 2017, with claims he was being attacked by left-wing organizations.

“Bill O’Reilly has been subjected to a brutal campaign of character assassination that is unprecedented in post-McCarthyist America,” Kasowitz said in a statement at the time. “This law firm has uncovered evidence that the smear campaign is being orchestrated by far-left organisations bent on destroying O’Reilly for political and financial reasons.”

O’Reilly has also served as an executive producer for multiple National Geographic Channel movie adaptations of the Killing series books, including Killing Jesus, Killing Kennedy, Killing Reagan, and Killing Lincoln.

In September, he released his second book, Confronting Evil: Assessing the Worst of the Worst, which he co-wrote with Josh Hammer. The non-fiction book looks at the most notorious figures in world history, including Genghis Khan, Henry VIII, and Vladimir Putin.

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