Former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has a theory about why Democrats are competitive heading into the midterms, and it starts with what he thinks of the voters.
O’Reilly told NewsNation host Leland Vittert on Monday, Oct. 26, 2026, that Americans would have to be “dumb” to elect the “radicals” running on the left, and that the only people who believe Democrats can fix the cost-of-living crisis are the ones who “aren’t paying attention.” Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.
Vittert told him it sounded as if he was blaming the voters.
“I am blaming the voters!” O’Reilly shot back.
As O’Reilly laid it out, the left has an opening because so many Americans have tuned politics out altogether and give their attention to entertainment and social media instead. Democrats, he argued, are running hard on affordability without attaching any specific solutions to it.
The Gas Price Clip Vittert Rolled
Vittert kept pushing on the emotional math. Plenty of Americans are saying they are hurting, he told O’Reilly, and only one party is telling them it understands and intends to do something about it.
Vittert then asked whether voters might turn to Democrats simply because they believe Trump doesn’t care about them. O’Reilly wasn’t buying it.
In his view, Americans are being “bamboozled” by corporate and social media. He then reached for a household example to argue that Democratic promises fall apart once the bills arrive.
A cheaper gallon of milk means nothing, he said, if property taxes climb 3% at the same time, because families still end up behind. That, he added, is what Democrats have always done.
“France on Steroids” if Progressives Win
O’Reilly had already admitted earlier in the conversation that the GOP has its own “deficits.” When Vittert circled back to that point, O’Reilly framed the election as a damage-control exercise, saying the choice comes down to a “matter of who’s going to do the most damage.”
Pressed further, O’Reilly maintained that voters are really choosing which side will do less harm at a moment when the economy dominates what people care about.
Asked whether he was worried that Trump and the GOP won’t close the sale in the final stretch before Election Day, O’Reilly went back to the voters.
O’Reilly said he fears for the country if voters are “this dumb” and fail to see what’s coming should progressives or democratic socialists win. That outcome, he warned, would turn the U.S. into “France on steroids.”
He Doesn’t Expect Trump to Pivot
O’Reilly sees no chance that the president tones down his message in the closing days to court undecided voters. Bending to please others, he said, simply isn’t Trump’s style.
Most Americans, as O’Reilly sees it, have already picked a side, splitting into one camp that hates Trump and another that likes him. The way he put it, “this midterm is going to be about Trump.”