Is this really the “unity” America is craving right now?
Comedy Central has announced that Bill O’Reilly will be Jon Stewart’s guest on Tuesday’s episode of The Daily Show airing after the Republican National Convention, giving the disgraced former Fox News host by far the biggest platform he’s had since his ouster from that network following revelations about multiple sexual harassment settlements seven years ago.
The decision to book O’Reilly comes after The Daily Show bagged its on-the-ground coverage of the RNC in Milwaukee—and canceled Stewart’s regular Monday show—in apparent deference to Donald Trump following the attempt on his life over the weekend.
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O’Reilly, who has been mostly in the wilderness since leaving Fox, hosting a podcast and mildly popular YouTube program in the style of his old O’Reilly Factor primetime show, has a long and surprisingly friendly history with Stewart.
The conservative host appeared on The Daily Show a whopping 13 times between 2001 and 2015 while Stewart was permanent host. And ahead of the 2012 election, the two men participated in a staged debate in Washington, D.C., dubbed “The Rumble in the Air-Conditioned Auditorium,” during which they stayed cordial despite their obvious ideological differences.
Of course, all of this was before the revelations emerged about O’Reilly’s allegedly inappropriate behavior toward female staffers at Fox News, which ultimately led the network to cut him loose in 2017.
