'Dallas Morning News' Publisher Stands by Columnist in O'Reilly Feud

By: E&P Staff Dallas Morning News Publisher Jim Moroney has defended a columnist that has raised the ire of political talk show host Bill O'Reilly.

Bill O'Reilly of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor has been asking viewers to cancel subscriptions to The Dallas Morning News based on a column that ran in last Sunday's paper.

A spokesperson for the Morning News said that the paper had gotten a number of e-mails because of O'Reilly's request but did not say whether there had been any cancellations related to the feud.

O'Reilly took issue with a column written by the Morning News' Macarena Hernandez, the same journalist who helped expose former New York Times reporter Jayson Blair as a plagiarist in 2003. In the column, Hernandez wrote about the murders of six Mexican farm workers in Georgia. At one point in her piece she criticizes O'Reilly's show for allegedly creating an intolerant environment. She wrote: "Do they watch Fox's The O'Reilly Factor, where the anchor and the callers constantly point to the southern border as the birth of all America's ills? (Sample comment: 'Each one of those people is a biological weapon.')"

Fox News had invited Moroney to appear on a show. But in a memo to a Fox producer obtained by E&P, Moroney declined, although he expressed support for Macarena.

Here's the memo in full:

Thank you for inviting The Dallas Morning News to participate in your program this evening. Ms. Hernandez's column, which ran in the editorial section on Friday, October 14, explored the lack of national attention paid to a series of heinous murders of immigrants in Georgia. The Dallas Morning News supports Ms. Hernandez's op-ed article as written and her right to express her opinion of such a serious crime freely. We appreciate that the O'Reilly Factor is helping to promote this important national dialogue on issues of immigrant rights and criminal justice.