Former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has condemned the far-right troll who sexually harassed Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the steps of the US Capitol, saying it “has to stop”.
Mr O’Reilly, who famously left Fox News amid a flurry of sexual harassment allegations, weighed into the issue after AOC shared footage of the man shouting lewd and derogatory comments about her appearance.
“Some loon stalked and insulted Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez then posted it,” Mr O’Reilly tweeted on Thursday.
“This has to stop. We need new laws to protect public officials and others. And we need them now.”
On Wednesday night, AOC shared footage of right-wing provocateur Alex Stein harassing her as she walked up the Capitol steps.
Mr Stein is heard yelling at the Democrat, calling her his “favourite big booty Latina” and accusing her of wanting to “kill babies”.
“See my favorite big booty Latina AOC! I love you AOC — you’re my favorite!” he shouts.
“She wants to kill babies, but she’s still beautiful. You look very beautiful in that dress. You look very sexy. Look at that big booty on AOC — that’s my favorite big booty Latina.”
AOC begins to walk toward him before throwing the peace sign and continuing up the stairs.
“Hot, hot, hot like a tamale!” Mr Stein continues to shout.
The New York congresswoman slammed the Capitol Police officers who failed to take any action while she was being sexually harassed before their eyes.
“I’m just going to share his photo here since there’s no other protection,” she tweeted, saying she was “actually walking over to deck him because if no one will protect us then I’ll do it myself but I needed to catch a vote more than a case today”.
AOC later said that “it’s clearly someone seeking extremist fame”.
Speaking to reporters about the incident on Thursday, AOC said that the US Capitol “is not a place that is designed to protect women, it’s not a place designed to protect LGBT people”.
She said that she fears that the “core security breakdowns” that unfolded on January 6 during the Capitol riot “have never been addressed”.
Mr O’Reilly’s defence of AOC this week marked a departure from other conservative commentators who sided with the right-wing troll over the incident at the Capitol.
Mr O’Reilly was himself accused of sexually harassing multiple former Fox News employees during his time as a long-running anchor at the network.
Fox News finally parted ways with him in 2017 after it emerged that it had made several multi-million-dollar payouts to multiple women to settle the allegations.
Mr O’Reilly has always denied any wrongdoing.
