Bill O’Reilly made up a JFK story. He got busted by an old tape recording
Somebody asked me about Bill O’Reilly the other day. I said:
USA Today (almost) tells the story of George de Mohrenschildt

As I said the other day, perhaps the best news coverage of the new JFK files comes from USA Today. But it could be better.
In this October 27 dispatch, Ray Locker uses the new JFK files to lay out the incredible story of George de Mohrenschildt. He was a geologist, a bon vivant, and a CIA informant who just happened–quite coincidentally, perhaps–to befriend a young man named Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas in the fall of 1962.
The only problem with Locker’s account is that it ends with de Mohrenschildt’s untimely death in 1977. Locker could have, and should have, reported the rest of the story.
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USA Today (almost) tells the story of George de MohrenschildtRead More »
Reporting on the Kennedy Assassination
Most saliently, Reporting on the Kennedy Assassination offers an intimate look at Oltmans’s collaboration with de Mohrenschildt on the book that would later become Lee Harvey Oswald as I Knew Him, and at the circumstances surrounding de Mohrenschildt’s death and his possible implication in Oswald’s actions.
New book recounts the ordeal of George de Mohrenschildt, friend of Lee Oswald
In “Reporting on the Kennedy Assassination,” the late Dutch journalist Willem Oltmans tells the story of his investigation of the JFK’s murder, especially his relationship with the enigmatic figure of George de Mohrenschildt, friend of Lee Oswald and sometime CIA asset. …
New book recounts the ordeal of George de Mohrenschildt, friend of Lee OswaldRead More »
Violent deaths forced Congress to re-open the JFK investigations
In 1976, Congress re-opened the investigation of the assassination of President Kennedy after three key witnesses died violent deaths within a year. …
Violent deaths forced Congress to re-open the JFK investigationsRead More »
Meet Joan Mellen, a prolific provocateur of American history
There is no JFK author more provocative, more entertaining, more knowledgeable, more infuriating, and more fun than Joan Mellen. …
Meet Joan Mellen, a prolific provocateur of American historyRead More »
Investigator’s tape exposes Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fib
(First published in JFK Facts, January 30, 2013)
In his best-selling book Killing Kennedy, Bill O’Reilly tells a brief tale of an intrepid reporter — himself — chasing the historical truth of JFK’s assassination in south Florida. But the story itself is a fiction, as O’Reilly reveals here in his own voice.

In the annals of the JFK assassination story, rife with CIA and FBI malfeasance, O’Reilly’s fanciful anecdote might seem trivial. It is not the saddest feature of his book, which manages to ignore all of the high-quality JFK assassination scholarship of the last two decades.
But as O’Reilly’s yarn is presented as fact in USA Today and the Fort-Worth Telegram; as his book dominates the best-seller charts; and as a credulous National Geographic embarks on making a documentary of Killing Kennedy, O’Reilly’s credibility matters.
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Investigator’s tape exposes Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fibRead More »
Comment of the week
Tom Scully – January 11
Let’s see if I have this right, Ed Butler is in Hale Bogg’s office in the capitol playing the Oswald radio debate tape before AF-1 unloads JFK’s Dallas casket. See: https://jfkfacts.org/assassination/comment-of-the-week-10/#comment-847322 …
Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fib was exposed by reporter’s audio tape
In his best-selling book Killing Kennedy, Bill O’Reilly tells a brief tale of an intrepid reporter — himself — chasing the historical truth of JFK’s assassination in south Florida. But the story itself is a fiction, as O’Reilly revealed in his own voice in an audio recording first published on JFK Facts.
CNN’s Brian Stelter picked up on the story, and I explained what really happened. …
Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fib was exposed by reporter’s audio tapeRead More »
Did George De Mohrenschildt know Lyndon Johnson?
As the Washington Post and CNN have reported, JFK Facts was the first news organization to expose Fox News host Bill O’Reilly for fibbing about JFK reporting in the 1970s. In his book Killing Kennedy O’Reilly wrote (on p. 300) that he was knocking on the door of the south Florida home of George de Mohrenschildt, a friend of Lee Harvey Oswald, when De Mohrenschildt committed suicide on March 29, 1977. O’Reilly said he heard the sound of the fatal shotgun blast.
Audio recordings, first published here in 2013, prove that O’Reilly, then a TV reporter for WFAA in Dallas, was actually in Texas at the time and planning to “come to Florida” as soon as possible. O’Reilly didn’t get to south Florida until the next day, as this WFAA video shows.
In O’Reilly’s defense, he really was chasing the De Mohrenschildt story at the time — and for good reason.
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Response to Shenon: evidence of CIA or US military intelligence participation in the assassination of JFK
The recent JFK Facts interview with Phil Shenon prompted longtime JFK author Robert Morrow to write a response.
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More video evidence illuminates Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fib
From the Washington Post’s Erik Wemple, some priceless video of the young Bill O’Reilly covering the story of the suicide of CIA asset and Oswald pal George de Mohrenschildt in March 1977. …
More video evidence illuminates Bill O’Reilly’s JFK fibRead More »
Another defense of Bill O’Reilly: ‘I have no explanation’
As far as I know I am the only blogger who was written in “In Defense of Bill O’Reilly” when it comes to one of his more egregious fibs. But now I am not alone.
Courtesy of Erik Wemple and the Washington Post: a defender of O’Reilly stands up for the embattled Fox News host and denies that he told a JFK whopper — sort of.
Bill O’Reilly hides behind a colleague’s account
The Washington Post‘s Erik Wemple reports:
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