• Home
  • Latest
  • Fortune 500
  • Finance
  • Tech
  • Leadership
  • Lifestyle
  • Rankings
  • Multimedia
Arts & EntertainmentRNC

Montel Williams Slams Bill O’Reilly For Calling Him a “Coward”

By
Brittany King
Brittany King
and
People
Down Arrow Button Icon
July 21, 2016, 4:59 PM ET
Photos by Gabe Ginsberg & Ray Tamarra — Getty Images

This piece originally appeared on People.com.

Fox News host Bill O’Reilly and Montel Williams are in an ugly public feud.

On Wednesday, the talk show host was set to appear on The O’Reilly Factor from the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, but walked out right before the segment began.

Upon hearing the news, O’Reilly, 66, called Williams a “coward” on-air and claimed that his guest “walked out in a huff … and the producer tells me he was mad about some gay thing.”

“He will never be never be on this program again,” the Fox News host continued. “He’s not a man of his word, he’s unprofessional. That is about as low as it gets.”

It didn’t take long for Williams, 60, to offer up his own explanation as well as sharing a few thoughts of his own about O’Reilly. He took to Twitter to write a series of tweets and a video on Periscope bashing the Fox News host and calling him the coward, “Bill calling me a coward is laughable. The guy who didn’t serve but lied about his war reporting?”

For more on RNC, watch this Fortune video:

He explained in the two-minute video that he initially agreed to be on O’Reilly’s show, but changed his mind when producers switched topics on him at the last minute. Williams claims he was told by O’Reilly’s team that his interview would focus on a speech he gave earlier in the day about LGBT rights as well as a recent poll suggesting President Barack Obama is a racist, but it was switched up right before he was set to go on.

“This is the first time I have not done an interview that I was scheduled to do, probably in the last five years,” Williams said in the video. “That does not bring O’Reilly’s show to a screeching halt. It should not have even affected Bill.”

“The word coward is usually used on people who have done most of the things that you’ve done, like embellishing lies about your credentials as a journalist, like the fact that your own daughter in a testimony in a court case … said that you dragged your ex-wife down a flight of stairs,” he continued. “You wanna talk about coward, homeboy? … That’s what a coward truly is, somebody who’s going to call somebody a name on air and not even to their face. I’m calling you one now, so the whole world can see it. We know who the coward is.”

“Leave me alone,” Williams added. “You don’t want me on your show anymore? … I don’t care.”

About the Authors
By Brittany King
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon
By People
See full bioRight Arrow Button Icon

Latest in Arts & Entertainment

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025

Most Popular

Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Finance
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam
By Fortune Editors
October 20, 2025
Rankings
  • 100 Best Companies
  • Fortune 500
  • Global 500
  • Fortune 500 Europe
  • Most Powerful Women
  • Future 50
  • World’s Most Admired Companies
  • See All Rankings
Sections
  • Finance
  • Leadership
  • Success
  • Tech
  • Asia
  • Europe
  • Environment
  • Fortune Crypto
  • Health
  • Retail
  • Lifestyle
  • Politics
  • Newsletters
  • Magazine
  • Features
  • Commentary
  • Mpw
  • CEO Initiative
  • Conferences
  • Personal Finance
  • Education
Customer Support
  • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Customer Service Portal
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms Of Use
  • Single Issues For Purchase
  • International Print
Commercial Services
  • Advertising
  • Fortune Brand Studio
  • Fortune Analytics
  • Fortune Conferences
  • Business Development
About Us
  • About Us
  • Editorial Calendar
  • Press Center
  • Work At Fortune
  • Diversity And Inclusion
  • Terms And Conditions
  • Site Map

Most Popular

placeholder alt text
Success
Billionaire philanthropy's growing divide: Mark Zuckerberg stops funding immigration reform as MacKenzie Scott doubles down on DEI
By Ashley LutzDecember 22, 2025
1 day ago
placeholder alt text
Success
Former U.S. Secret Service agent says bringing your authentic self to work stifles teamwork: 'You don’t get high performers, you get sloppiness'
By Sydney LakeDecember 22, 2025
2 days ago
placeholder alt text
Success
The average worker would need to save for 52 years to claw their way out of the middle class and be classified as wealthy, new research reveals
By Orianna Rosa RoyleDecember 23, 2025
13 hours ago
placeholder alt text
Travel & Leisure
After pouring $450 million into Florida real estate, Larry Ellison plans to lure the ultrarich to an exclusive town just minutes from Mar-a-Lago
By Marco Quiroz-GutierrezDecember 22, 2025
2 days ago
placeholder alt text
Success
'When we got out of college, we had a job waiting for us': 80-year-old boomer says her generation left behind a different economy for her grandkids
By Mike Schneider and The Associated PressDecember 23, 2025
16 hours ago
placeholder alt text
Success
OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman says in 10 years' time college graduates will be working 'some completely new, exciting, super well-paid' job in space
By Preston ForeDecember 23, 2025
14 hours ago

© 2025 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice | Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.


Latest in Arts & Entertainment

North AmericaU.S. Politics
Republican lawmaker and notable Trump critic Ben Sasse announces stage 4 cancer: ‘Now marching to the beat of a faster drummer’
By The Associated PressDecember 23, 2025
10 hours ago
KFC
Arts & EntertainmentChristmas
‘That really stuck’: Here’s how a 1970s campaign to sell Kentucky Fried Chicken with a bottle of wine became a Japanese Christmas tradition
By Luis Andres Henao and The Associated PressDecember 22, 2025
1 day ago
Paramount
LawM&A
Not only did Larry Ellison personally guarantee $40.4 billion for his son’s pursuit of Warner Bros., Paramount upped the break fee to $5.8 billion
By Wyatte Grantham-Philips and The Associated PressDecember 22, 2025
1 day ago
Dinner Bell
Arts & EntertainmentRestaurants
‘You sure don’t see too many of those anymore’: Miss. restaurant defies history, with only 4 tables, massive lazy Susans and wild popularity
By Sophie Bates and The Associated PressDecember 22, 2025
1 day ago
Big TechMeta
Meta’s Threads makes a play for podcasters and their rabid fans
By Ashley Carman and BloombergDecember 22, 2025
2 days ago
Arts & EntertainmentMovies
Hallmark’s catalog of 300+ Christmas movies watched by millions all started with the world’s first written-for-TV opera in 1951
By Molly Liebergall and Morning BrewDecember 22, 2025
2 days ago