| | | | | Growing ad boycott against Bill O'Reilly | | The headaches continued for Bill O'Reilly and Fox News on Wednesday. Even Advil yanked ads from O'Reilly's show. The boycott is up to about 50 companies. Meanwhile, advocates sought to put the focus back on his alleged victims. Maxine Waters, who has a history with O'Reilly, told Chris Hayes that "Bill O'Reilly needs to go to jail." She called Fox News a "sexual harassment enterprise."
There were also new revelations about the ongoing federal investigation of Fox. But O'Reilly did receive one high-profile endorsement on Wednesday -- from President Trump. So let's start there, because the NYT just published the must-read transcript of its Oval Office interview with Trump... | | | Trump says "I don't think Bill would do anything wrong" | | While speaking with Maggie Haberman and Glenn Thrush, POTUS repeatedly criticized the NYT; called Andrea Mitchell "Hillary Clinton's P.R. person;" and went off the record at least once. It was during one of his off the record asides that he mentioned O'Reilly. Back on the record, Haberman asked, "do you think that he's being unfairly treated?" Yes, Trump indicated -- "He's a good person... I think he shouldn't have settled... I don't think Bill would do anything wrong."
At that point, aide Hope Hicks interjected -- "Can we get to infrastructure?" There was laughter in the room. Hicks said Trump was short on time... | | Tom Kludt emailed around 6pm: O'Reilly Factor exodus count is currently at 47 (we'll probably top 50 by night's end). The most notable withdrawal on Wednesday came from Jenny Craig. Two days ago, the company avoided the Q, citing "corporate policy." But now it's saying "we suspended all ads on The O'Reilly Factor." Here are all the responses we've gotten so far... | | Here's another advertiser to add to the list: Nutrisystem. The organizers at Color of Change tell me that Nutrisystem responded directly to the progressive group's "Drop O'Reilly" pressure campaign. Nutrisystem's comment: "Over the past few months, we've been placed in that day-part a handful of times. We currently have no plans to air in this particular day-part..." | | -- Via Tom Kludt: There were 22 commercials on the "Factor" Wednesday night versus 33 last night...
-- "This is a surprisingly quick and strong exodus of advertisers," Jane Hall told the AP's David Bauder...
-- Margaret Sullivan's latest: "Culture of misogyny makes O'Reilly's hotline defense nothing short of ridiculous..."
-- Wendy Walsh called that 21st Century Fox hotline on Wednesday. Emily Steel and Michael Schmidt have details here...
-- Amidst all this, a reminder of O'Reilly's media power: His new book "Old School" is debuting at #1 on the NYT best sellers list despite very little off-Fox promotion... | | Brian Lowry emails: Amid the O'Reilly advertiser fallout, it's worth noting that the lion's share of Fox News revenue comes from subscriber fees, and the fact -- to use a rather colloquial example -- that your retired uncle who watches the channel all day would complain loudly if his cable/satellite operator didn't carry it.
Read Lowry's full piece here... | | | Sponsors fleeing, but viewers aren't | | Following up on Lowry's point -- "Factor" viewership was even higher on Tuesday, 3.76 million, than it was on Monday, 3.65 million. I pay close attention to the lead-in... to see how much O'Reilly spikes the #'s... and on Tuesday, the 7 p.m. hour averaged 2.23 million viewers, meaning O'Reilly added 1.5 million viewers... | | | O'Reilly's contract expiration date: sometime after 2020? | | That's what Paul Farhi reported in Wednesday's WashPost... that O'Reilly's recent contract renewal keeps him at Fox "until at least 2020..." | | | OK, so with all that in mind... | | ...Let's be candid about what everybody in the media biz is talking about right now. Will Bill O'Reilly survive this?
Quoting Tom Kludt's latest story: The Q is met with dismissiveness from some, who cite O'Reilly's air of invincibility, the fact that he's weathered so many firestorms before and his undeniable importance to Fox News. Others believe this time just feels different...
>> "In the end, it's math," said one on-air personality at a rival network. "If it costs them more than it gets them, he's gone..." | | -- What's the more popular POV inside Fox, that rivals (including CNN) are blowing this story way out of proportion, or that O'Reilly is a serious liability for the network?
-- Will advertisers quietly return to the "Factor" or will this be a long-term shift?
-- Is O'Reilly having any difficulty booking the guests he wants?
-- Erin Geiger Smith tweets: "Will O'Reilly be booked on his regular round of news/talk shows when it's time to sell the new book?" | | | Gretchen Carlson speaking on Thursday... | | ...She'll be on stage at Tina Brown's Women in the World summit. Carlson can't go into detail about Fox or O'Reilly due to her settlement agreement, but the session will be intriguing... | | Dylan Byers emails: On the political front, Trump's decision to weigh in on the O'Reilly controversy has turned the issue into a political football, with each side rushing to defend or condemn the Fox host. But if it is irresponsible for the president to say O'Reilly didn't do anything wrong -- and indeed it is -- it is equally irresponsible for Rep. Waters to call for his imprisonment without knowing all the facts.
--> What we need is an honest and comprehensive response from O'Reilly, Fox News and 21st Century Fox -- one that goes beyond scapegoating accusers because they didn't call some anonymous hotline. So far, it seems like we're unlikely to get that. 21st Century Fox is staying quiet... | | Bill Carter and I will be talking about all this on CNN's "New Day" at 6:50am Thursday. Now to the day's other media news... | | -- This could be a very big deal: "ABC 'Pink Slime' case headed for trial after appeal is rejected" (Reuters)
-- Joe Flint tweets: "Discovery CEO David Zaslav's 2016 compensation package valued at $37.2 million. That's a lot of shark sandwiches..."
-- Sara Fischer reports: Bloomberg LP is merging "its government policy business, Bloomberg Government (BGOV), with its legal and regulatory business arm, Bloomberg BNA (BBNA), to create a single unit that will cover Washington." No job cuts... (Axios) | | Right now I'm out in Doylestown, PA, speaking at Delaware Valley University along with NPR's David Folkenflik... and congrats are in order for Folkenflik... on Wednesday Penn State said he is this year's recipient of the Bart Richards Award for Media Criticism... | | | Pepsi cans its Kendall Jenner ad | | Headline credit goes to Frank Pallotta, who emails: Pepsi removed its controversial Kendall Jenner, social justice, save-the-world-with-a-soda ad, just one day after it triggered an online backlash. "Pepsi was trying to project a global message of unity," the company said in a statement. "Clearly we missed the mark, and we apologize." Read more here... | | Expect some Comcast news on Thursday... | | Comcast said last fall that it would be launching wireless service in 2017... and we'll be hearing details on Thursday. The company is holding an event for analysts starting at 9am ET. Info here... | | Salena Zito and Brad Todd, who together popularized the literally v. seriously adage about Trump, are writing a book. They've "nabbed a book deal with Penguin Random House's Crown Forum imprint," Page Six reports... "The Great Divide" will come out next spring... | | | Hire these H.S. student reporters someday! | | Reporters passed this story along all day long... it's a feel-good story for journos, though maybe not for principals...
"Days after student reporters at Pittsburg High School in Kansas dug into the background of their newly hired principal and found questionable credentials, she resigned from the $93,000-a-year job," The Kansas City Star reports.
Trina Paul, an editor of the school paper, the Booster Redux, said simply: "We wanted to be assured that she was qualified and had the proper credentials." | | | Trump dined with Pirro and Limbaugh | | Politico's Annie Karni scoops: "Rush Limbaugh and his wife, Kathryn, had dinner with Trump in his residence on March 23... The same week, Trump hosted Jeanine Pirro for dinner... | | "Does @SeanSpicer treat the press like a bunch of kindergarteners?" Here's the video mash-up... | | | YouTube's cable-like streaming service is now for sale in 5 markets | | The virtual MVPD competition continues. How many homes will sign up for this one? "Google's YouTube officially launched its new live TV streaming service, YouTube TV, on Wednesday," CNNMoney's Kaya Yurieff reports. The $35-per-month service is available in NYC, L.A., S.F., Chicago, and Philly right now. "The company says it will be adding more cities soon..." | | | MGM becoming sole owner of Epix | | MGM is spending "slightly more than $1 billion to buy out its longtime partners in the Epix movie service, Viacom's Paramount Pictures and Lionsgate," Meg James of the LATimes reports. "The transaction values the pay-TV movie network at $1.275 billion..." | | On Wednesday "Netflix's five-star rating system vanished. In its place are thumbs up and thumbs down buttons," CNNMoney's Jackie Wattles writes. Here's Netflix's logic: "When people see thumbs, they know that they are used to teach the system about their tastes with the goal of finding more great content." | | | What one of ABC's fictional presidents is up to | | Brian Lowry emails: Wednesday night's episode of ABC's "Designated Survivor" features the fictional president, played by Kiefer Sutherland, participating in a televised town hall. In the "plain talk" dept., the exchanges -- which focus on several current hot-button issues -- include having the president tell an unemployed West Virginia man that the job he lost to mechanization likely won't be coming back... | | What do you like about this newsletter? What do you dislike? Send your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. We appreciate every email. | |  | | We'd love to share our other newsletters with you. Check out Five Things for Your New Day, CNN's morning newsletter. Give us five minutes, and we'll brief you on all the news and buzz people will be talking about. | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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