Bill O'Reilly says the GOP is in trouble now that Tucker Carlson is out at Fox — and bringing his far-right viewers with him

• Bill O'Reilly predicts Tucker Carlson's ouster at Fox News will cause trouble for the GOP.
• Carlson has great influence over the party's far-right flank, O'Reilly said.

Bill O'Reilly, who was forced out from Fox News in 2017, thinks Tucker Carlson's ouster from Fox News could have not only "a tremendous effect on the future of the Fox News Channel," but also on the 2024 presidential election.

"Because the Republican Party, most of it, paid attention to Tucker Carlson," O'Reilly said on Monday on an episode of his show, "No Spin News."

"But the Republican profile in the media is much less now," he added. "And that will have an effect on mostly independent voters. Because, you know, the word won't get out as fast, whatever the word may be."

O'Reilly added that Fox News was run based on "fiefdoms," where every show ran its own programming. Carlson's fiefdom was focused on the Americans on the "committed right," O'Reilly said. With Carlson out at Fox News, his audience will have few popular figures in the right-wing media sphere to look to, he said.

"So Carlson had a very successful run at Fox and was very influential among committed conservatives. They're different than casual conservatives. They're right there every day," O'Reilly said.

Carlson lost his primetime spot at Fox News on Monday in a shock announcement from the network. Carlson's ouster looks a little different from O'Reilly's: The latter was forced out from Fox News after numerous sexual harassment lawsuits against him piled up, per The New York Times.

Carlson's ousting comes a week after Fox settled, to the tune of $787.5 million, a massive defamation lawsuit filed against it by the voting technology company Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion accused Fox News and its hosts — including Carlson — of hurting its business by spreading baseless claims about election fraud in the 2020 presidential election.

Carlson also faces a lawsuit from his ex-producer, Abby Grossberg, who sued him and other Fox executives in March. In her complaint, Grossberg alleged that Carlson and the other executives created "a work environment that subjugates women based on vile sexist stereotypes."

A lawyer for Carlson did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent outside regular business hours.