NEW YORK — Fox News host Jesse Watters finally addressed controversial comments he made on an April 11 episode of “The Five,” where he confessed he’d deflated the tires of a young colleague he was “trying to get to go out with (him)” while still married to his first wife.
Watters now says he was joking and unable to respond earlier to the growing controversy because he’d hurt his back and was indisposed.
At the end of Monday’s episode of “The Five,” Watters was asked to explain the mystery around his absence in the aftermath of his jarring statements.
“I threw my back out,” he claimed. “Look, there I am!”
Fox News posted an image of the host on a hospital stretcher to argue Watters’ case.
His co-host Greg Guttfeld claimed Watters’ clarification he was joking on that show two weeks ago was cut from that day’s broadcast. His colleagues said they’d been asked by worried viewers if he was on suspension over his remarks.
“That was a joke,” Watters claimed. “I never deflated anyone’s tires.”
He referred to the scandal as “TireGate.”
Watters, who was not on the air last week, had not until now commented on the controversy that ensued days after video of him making his odd statements on “The Five” went viral.
Fox News declined requests for comment last week.
On that show earlier this month, Watters said, “When I was trying to get Emma (DiGiovine) to date me, first thing I did, let the air out of her tires.”
His stunned colleagues gave no indication they were in on any sort of joke.
”She couldn’t go anywhere, she needed a lift,” Watters told his co-hosts. “I said ‘Hey you need a lift?’ She (got) right into the car.”
One of Watters colleagues asked if he was serious. Another compared him to the Zodiac Killer. Watters, 43, claimed the story had a “happy ending” because he went on to marry that co-worker after divorcing his first wife, with whom he has two young daughters.
The panel had been discussing environmental activists allegedly supporting the deflating the tires of SUVs in the name of environmentalism.
Fox News told the Daily News in 2018 that Watters informed the company’s human relations department in 2017 that he was involved in a relationship with DiGiovine. Watters divorced his first wife and married his second one in 2019.
In addition to co-hosting “The Five” at 5 p.m. on weekdays, he began hosting the 7 p.m. “Jesse Watters Primetime” in January. That show leads into “Tucker Carlson Tonight” whose host, Tucker Carlson, prevailed in a 2020 defamation suit after Fox News lawyers argued successfully that, according to a district judge, no “reasonable person” would think the network’s biggest star is “stating actual facts.”
Carlson and Watters are both graduates of Connecticut’s Trinity College, which also claims conservative commentator George Will and “Real Housewives” star Kelly Bensimon among its alumni.
Fox News viewers don’t seem bothered by the hybrid of truth and fiction with which they’re being entertained. Ratings for “The Five,” “Jesse Watters Primetime” and “Tucker Carlson Tonight” are stellar in comparison to other cable news networks the outlet considers its competitors.
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