Fox News' hysterical Hillary freakout: O'Reilly & Hannity go on the warpath over "Scooby Van"

Bill O'Reilly wants to make one thing very clear: "I am not running after her van!"

Published April 17, 2015 12:56PM (EDT)

  (Fox News)
(Fox News)

Last night, Fox News did its best to establish the official narrative about the first week of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, with both Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly rolling out segments about how disastrously it went.

"Hannity" featured a recap of the week, beginning with criticism of her announcement video on Sunday; an account of reporters chasing her "Scooby Van" and the media's preoccupation with her stop at Chipotle; the revelation that some of the people "bused in" to her "spontaneous" campaign stops have ties to the Democratic party; and concluding with the discovery of a photograph showing that the "Scooby Van" had been allowed to idle in a handicapped parking spot on Thursday.

Fox News analyst Kirsten Powers defended the only legitimate charge against the Clinton campaign -- that a stop they claimed was spontaneous turned out to be staged -- by saying that all of the people who turn up at early events are likely to be interested in politics generally, and party politics in particular, so it was no surprise that one of the people Clinton spoke to had worked for Vice President Joe Biden.

Hannity refused to concede, insisting that the campaign said the stop was spontaneous, when it turned out that people were "bused in."

"'Bused in' is an exaggeration," Powers replied. "We're talking about a couple of people who rode in a car together. That's just standard fare for people at those events. That's normal, Sean."

He shot back, saying that if they were going to "bus in Democratic operatives," the campaign shouldn't claim that these are spontaneous, unscripted events. Hannity then complained about the "amenities" in the "Scooby Van" -- the television, the bed, the heated seats -- and the fact that it was caught idling in a handicapped spot. "You'd think a 'woman of the people' could park in a regular spot like the rest of us," he said.

Watch the entire "Hannity" segment below via Fox News.

Bill O'Reilly echoed Hannity's complaints in his "Talking Points Memo," saying that her campaign has become fodder for pundits like himself, as well as late-night comedians, because all of the attention given to the campaign has been negative.

He criticized her for not subjecting herself to interviews like her Republican candidates, even though he admitted that she has little to gain from sitting down and talking to members of a "skeptical media," since she's already a known quantity.

O'Reilly expressed his desire to interview her, but said "I am not running after her van," then repeated, more vehemently, "I am not running after her van!"

Watch the entire "Talking Points Memo" segment below via Fox News.


By Scott Eric Kaufman

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