Megyn Kelly has promised to take a non-partisan approach to her new show on Fox News, but one liberal watchdog group is doubting that claim.
The group Media Matters, which frequently battles with Fox News over its perceived bias, says that Kelly is a bigger threat than personalities like Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, who wear their allegiance on their sleeves.
“Kelly does not breathe fire like her primetime cohorts, but she can be every bit as partisan and misleading,” Simon Maloy of the Media Matters wrote on Monday.
Maloy noted that the other, more aggressive Fox News hosts are dismissed as partisan pundits, but Megyn Kelly represents a bigger threat. Her ideology is a bit more hidden beneath the surface, leading viewers to believe she is unbiased, Maloy writes.
Megyn is being tapped to take over Hannity’s 9 pm EST slot with her new show, The Kelly File . The move is part of a shakeup at Fox News that is seeing Hannity move to the 10 pm time slot and Greta Van Susteren move from 10 pm to 7 pm.
Fox News chief Roger Ailes said the change will allow for a seamless transition between hard news and commentary.
“The talent will be more like an NFL quarterback with the ability to call audibles when he sees openings,” Ailes said . “We will move seamlessly between the teleprompter and storytelling, and the public will have an opportunity to see how the news is being put together and how the programs are built.”
But it is exactly this shift that is so worrying to Media Matters and other left-leaning groups. They see Fox News as a powerful force in the media, a mouthpiece for Republicans that can further the right’s agenda.
Megyn Kelly has promised that she will report on news rather than give opinion, however.
“It’s going to be a live broadcast… a breaking news program, not an opinion program so I’m not going to be the female Bill [O’Reilly],” Kelly said.
Megyn Kelly made her debut on Monday.