Fox News moves a step closer to showing Sean Hannity the door
With Bill O’Reilly having recently been ousted due to a sexual harassment scandal, and Sean Hannity subsequently having been accused of the same, all eyes have been on Fox News to see what it decided to do with co-president Bill Shine. Hannity’s defiant tweets hinted that he knew his own fate hinged on Shine remaining in place. But now today Fox has ousted Shine, opening the door to total chaos.
Four days ago, when word first leaked that Fox News might be in the process of ousting Bill Shine, an angry Sean Hannity tweeted that “I pray this is NOT true because if it is, that’s the total end of the FNC as we know it. Done.” (link). Then he launched a not so veiled threat at one of his own higher-up bosses: “Somebody HIGH UP AND INSIDE FNC is trying to get an innocent person fired.” (link). When a report asserted that the Murdochs were refusing to support Shine, Hannity insisted that “I’ll change it.”
But whatever internal power play Sean Hannity was trying to pull in order to keep Bill Shine in place, we now know that his efforts have failed. Fox News publicly announced today that Shine is officially out. This means that A) Hannity lacked the clout to protect Shine, an B) Fox News was unwilling to leave Hannity’s ally Shine in place with Hannity’s sexual harassment scandal kicking into gear. So now what?
As of last night, Hannity was tweeting about how thoroughly he plans to fight the sexual harassment allegation: “Sadly sadly I agree with this. I have 3 high powered attorneys and 2 amazing top class investigators I have hired. They have no idea” (link). Considering that this was long after close of business hours last night, Shine had probably already been axed, and Hannity probably knew it. So he’s going to dig in and fight the allegation – but Fox News clearly doesn’t have his back on this. This paves the way for total chaos at Fox, and seemingly, Hannity’s eventual demise. Help fund Palmer Report
