Fox News Media announced Thursday that Trump campaign adviser Harlan Z. Hill, a self-described Washington public relations and political consultant, is no longer welcome on their air after he tweeted that Democratic vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris “comes off as an insufferable lying bitch.”
“We have no intention of booking him as a guest on any of our platforms,” a Fox News Media spokesperson said in a statement to The Daily Beast, the morning after Hill—a frequent Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network guest over the past five years—unleashed his misogynistic attack on the Black California senator during her debate with Vice President Mike Pence.
Hill’s tweet—which was on-brand with President Donald Trump’s repeated claim on Thursday morning to Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo that Harris is “a monster”—provoked immediate condemnation along with around 6,000 retweets and 6,300 likes from Trump partisans.
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It also received sharp responses from, among others, former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson and former paid contributor Julie Roginsky—both of whom sued the channel claiming sexual harassment and discrimination and received monetary settlements.
Carlson—whose July 2016 sexual discrimination and harassment lawsuit resulted in the ouster of Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes and won her a $20 million settlement—tweeted “Uhhh…THIS” over Roginsky’s comment: “To be clear: Fox News jettisons women who do nothing more than speak up about being sexually harassed but promote men who call women ‘bitches.’ But please, Fox PR: tell us again about how the culture has changed for the better over there.”
Along with former Fox News Digital anchor Diana Falzone (a co-author of this story), Carlson and Roginsky have been pressing the company to release them and all ex-Fox employees from their non-disclosure agreements.
Hill—whose Twitter bio identifies him as a member of the Trump campaign’s advisory board, and who has appeared on video with campaign official and presidential daughter-in-law Lara Trump—claims erroneously on his bio to be a Fox News “commentator.”
But although Hill has not been on Fox’s payroll, he has done at least 47 guest appearances on Fox News or Fox Business programs since Dec. 13, 2017, when he was featured on Fox Business’s Varney & Co., according to a spot-check by The Daily Beast. His most recent Fox appearance was on June 16 of this year, again with Fox Business anchor Stuart Varney.
On his personal website, Hill—who during the 2016 Democratic primary campaign claimed to be a Bernie Sanders supporter before becoming a Republican Trump acolyte—listed MSNBC and CNN as outlets on which he’s appeared. A CNN spokesperson told The Daily Beast that Hill has not appeared on that channel since Oct. 20, 2016. And a spokesperson for MSNBC texted, “It does not seem that he’s been on with us.”
“I’ve been a guest on Fox News, Fox Business for 5 years. I am not a contributor,” Hill said in a series of direct messages in which he doubled down on his misogynistic insult of Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s running mate.
“Kamala Harris was extraordinarily disrespectful to the vice president last night, lied to the American people repeatedly on The Biden/Harris platform, and was just generally unlikable and smug,” Hill texted. “I tweeted what I tweeted and I’d tweet it again.”
Hill also addressed a November 2018 green-room dustup he had in Fox News’ Washington Bureau with Hillary Clinton adviser Philippe Reines.
A person familiar told The Daily Beast that Fox News staffers reprimanded Hill after the confrontation—which Hill denied.
“Reines and I had an argument in the newsroom when he yelled some homophobic (I’m straight btw) nonsense at me bc I had just embarrassed him on air,” Hill claimed in a direct message. “First I’ve heard of being reprimanded by Fox. Still love the Network and have enjoyed being a guest over there for 5 years”—a sentiment that is apparently unrequited as of Thursday.
Reines, for his part, told The Daily Beast that the alleged “homophobic nonsense” was him merely repeating the comment of a Fox News makeup artist—after Hill behaved like “a jackass” on then-Fox Business anchor Trish Regan’s show—that Hill had a hair sprouting from his nose that “looked like a pubic hair.” He added, “If I had a pubic hair coming out my nose, I’d hope someone would tell me.”
“I had never heard of him before,” Reines said about the encounter, “and I haven’t thought about him since.”
