Shep Smith on former employment at Fox News: ‘I stuck with it for as long as I could’

Former Fox News host Shepard Smith blasted his previous employer in an interview set to air Tuesday evening, saying many at the network have repeatedly “propagated the lies.”

“I don’t know how some people sleep at night,” Smith said in an interview with Christiane Amanpour of PBS News. “I know that there are a lot of people who have propagated the lies and have pushed them forward over and over again who are smart enough and educated enough to know better.”

“I stuck with it as long as I could,” says former Fox News host Shep Smith. But does he think some of his former colleagues spread disinformation? “I don’t know how some people sleep at night… There are a lot of people… who are smart enough and educated enough to know better.” pic.twitter.com/pqrOhVuKgR

— Christiane Amanpour (@camanpour) January 19, 2021

The Hill has reached out to Fox News for comment.

Smith was at Fox News for 23 years before leaving in 2019. He often pushed back against President Trump during his time at the network and was having disagreements with Fox News host Tucker Carlson at the time of his departure. Smith landed at CNBC in 2020 and hosts “The News with Shepard Smith.”

“If you feel like the Fox viewers were getting mis- or disinformation, I was there to make sure that they got it straight,” Smith said Tuesday. “There were a lot of others in there who were trying to do the same thing. But I thought to just abandon it and to deprive those viewers … to deny them that, with the thought that they might replace it with opinion instead, seemed a little selfish. So I stuck with it for as long as I could.”

Smith went on to say that he tried to “just keep the blinders” on at Fox and report the news. He said he didn’t feel that his colleagues on the opinion shows were using the truth to form their positions.

“Opine all you like, but if you’re going to opine, begin with the truth and opine from there. And it’s that deviation from that that has caused me the greatest concern. I believe that when people begin with a false premise and lead people to astray, that’s injurious to society, and it’s the antithesis of what we should be doing,” Smith said.

Following the deadly riot at the Capitol, Smith stopped CNBC from airing Trump’s video in which he called the rioters “special” people just hours after the deadly attack.