Bill O’Reilly falsely doubled down that Jeffrey Epstein was convicted under Joe Biden’s administration.
While appearing on NewsNation Monday night, host Leland Vittert had to correct O’Reilly multiple times after the former “O’Reilly Factor” star asserted that the disgraced film financier was convicted under Biden’s admin by Attorney General Merrick Garland. Epstein was both arrested and committed suicide in 2019 – a full year and a half before Biden took office.
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“Epstein was convicted during the Biden administration,” O’Reilly said.
“Hold on, Bill,” Vittert interrupted. “You said Epstein was convicted during the Biden administration. Epstein committed suicide during the Trump administration.”
“Yeah, so?” O’Reilly asked.
“How do you convict a guy that is dead?” Vittert responded.
“I believe he was convicted under Merrick Garland’s justice department,” O’Reilly said attempting to regain his footing. “Then he was incarcerated. Then he committed suicide. The suicide thing is bull…”
At that point, Vittert interrupted O’Reilly once more to clarify the timeline. “Bill, I think this is important, he was arrested in 2019 and committed suicide in 2019, died August 10th of 2019. So the Biden administration was not involved in a conviction or a trial of him.”
“He was arrested and indicted under Merrick Garland,” O’Reilly continued to falsely claim. “Who had all the information…”
“No! Under Trump,” Vittert corrected again. “Epstein was arrested, indicted and committed suicide under Trump in 2019. Trump was president. Merrick Garland was not the attorney general.”
A new fervor in Epstein and his purported client list arose after a new memo released by the DOJ and FBI released last week insisted the Trump-mandated investigation into Epstein’s criminal past “did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.” This came mere months after Bondi told Fox News that she was in possession of a list of that very nature.
The news – or lack thereof – about the Epstein list created a schism in Donald Trump’s MAGA base with some passionate for information on one end and those ready to move onto the next topic on the other. For O’Reilly, it meant falsely breaking down the timeline of Epstein’s conviction.
“I stand corrected,” O’Reilly finally conceded.
You can watch the full exchange in the video above.
The post Bill O’Reilly Corrected On-Air Over False Claim Biden Oversaw Epstein Conviction: ‘How Do You Convict a Guy That Is Dead?’ | Video appeared first on TheWrap.
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