Jesse Bailey Watters (born July 9, 1978) is an American conservative[1] political commentator and television program host on the Fox Newscable television network. He frequently appeared earlier in his media career on the political talk show The O'Reilly Factor with commentator/moderator Bill O'Reilly and was known for his man-on-the-street interviews, featured in his segment there of "Watters' World", which became its own show in 2015. In January 2017, Watters' World became weekly, and in April 2017, he became a co-host of the roundtable series The Five. Watters became host of his own program Jesse Watters Primetime on the Fox News Channel in January 2022.
In the literary field, he had his first book published, How I Saved the World by HarperCollins' of New York City and London. Broadside Books (a subsidiary imprint of HarperCollins) published his second work, Get It Together: Troubling Tales from the Liberal Fringe, in March 2024.
Early life and education
Watters was raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in several neighborhoods of the northwest city, and then briefly during high school to Long Island, New York.[2] He is the son of Stephen Hapgood Watters, a teacher, and child psychologist Anne Purvis, daughter of Morton Bailey, Jr., publisher of Better Homes and Gardens magazine.[3] His maternal great-grandfather was another Morton Bailey, publisher of the prominent longtime magazine The Saturday Evening Post; his maternal great-great-grandfather was Morton S. Bailey (1855–1922), a lawyer, politician, state senator and district judge in Colorado, later serving as an Associate Justice on the Colorado Supreme Court in the state capital of Denver, Colorado.
This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (November 2024)
After graduation from Trinity College in Hartford, Watters began work as a production assistant at Fox News in New York City.[11] In 2003, he moved to the production staff of The O'Reilly Factor;[12] in 2004, Watters began to appear on air in segments of O'Reilly's show.[13]
On June 11, 2014, Watters debuted on the Fox News Channel show Outnumbered, later occasionally appearing as a guest co-host. On November 20, 2015, Watters debuted his own monthly Fox News program, Watters' World.[14] While Watters is characterized as an "ambush journalist",[15][16][17] Watters has said, "I try to make it enjoyable for the person I'm interviewing. We always come away from the interview all smiles, for the most part. And it's always fun to come back and look at the footage and say, 'Oh my gosh, what just happened?'"[9] In January 2017, Watters' World became a weekly show, airing Saturdays at 8 p.m. ET.[18][19]
In April 2017, Watters became a co-host of the roundtable series The Five.
After being one of several rotating fill-in hosts in the network's 7 p.m. time slot, it was announced on January 10, 2022 that Watters would become the permanent host of a new primetime show, titled Jesse Watters Primetime, which debuted on January 24, 2022.[22]
Watters' World program ended its run on January 15, 2022, while Watters continues to be a co-host of the continuing The Five.[23]
In June 2023, Fox News announced Watters as the permanent host of the network's 8 p.m. EST hour following the firing of controversial fellow conservative commentator Tucker Carlson.[24]
In January 2024, he presented to his viewers a thought, without evidence, that Taylor Swift and Kansas City chiefs player Travis Kelce's relationship was part of a "psyop" directed by the U.S. Department of Defense.[25][26] In July of 2024, he joked that he "heard the scientists say the other day that when a man votes for a woman, he actually transitions into a woman."[27]
Controversies
Amanda Terkel stalking
In 2009, on assignment for The O'Reilly Factor, Watters and his cameraman followed journalist Amanda Terkel in her car for two hours while she drove to Winchester, Virginia, for vacation, and then accosted her to ask her questions about an article she wrote that was critical of Bill O'Reilly.
Seven years later, at the White House Correspondents Dinner journalists' reception, The Huffington Post's Ryan Grim approached Watters with his phone camera running and asked him to walk over to Terkel and apologize. Watters at first said he would apologize and then said he would not, adding, "I ambushed her because O'Reilly told me to get her because she said some bad shit."[28][29] Video of the incident shows Watters then grabbing Grim's phone and throwing it on the floor, and later grabbing it again and putting it in his pocket. Eventually, the two got into a shoving match, as Grim attempted to recover his phone. Watters later commented on the incident on The O'Reilly Factor, stating, "I was at this party trying to enjoy myself. This guy came up to me. He starts putting it in my face."[30]
Terkel wrote that Watters' response was "surprising", considering that "Watters' way of confronting his subjects is to thrust cameras in their faces unexpectedly and pepper them with aggressive questions."[28][30]
Chinatown segment
In October 2016, Watters was criticized for a segment of Watters' World that was widely considered racist toward Asian Americans.[31][32] In New York City's Chinatown, Watters asked Chinese Americans if they knew karate (a Japanese martial art), if he should bow before he greets them, or if their watches were stolen.[31][33] Throughout the segment, the 1974 song "Kung Fu Fighting" plays in the background, and the interviews are interspersed with references to martial arts and clips of Watters getting a foot massage and playing with nunchucks.[32][33] New York City mayor Bill de Blasio denounced Watters' segment as "vile, racist behavior" that "has no place in our city".[34] Numerous other lawmakers and journalists, including US Senator Mazie Hirono and US Representative Judy Chu, also condemned Watters.[35] The segment was also criticized by the Asian American Journalists Association, which issued a statement saying, "We should be far beyond tired, racist stereotypes and targeting an ethnic group for humiliation and objectification on the basis of their race."[36]
On October 5, 2016, Watters tweeted what Variety's Will Thorne called a "non-apology" about the segment. In the two tweets, Watters stated that "My man-on-the-street interviews are meant to be taken as tongue-in-cheek and I regret if anyone found offense. ... As a political humorist, the Chinatown segment was intended to be a light piece, as all Watters' World segments are."[37][38][39]
Ivanka Trump comments
In April 2017, two days after joining The Five as co-host, Watters made an on-air comment about Ivanka Trump (daughter of 45th President Donald J. Trump), that was criticized as lewd. After viewing video footage of Ms. Trump speaking on a panel about female entrepreneurship, Watters commented, "So I don't really get what's going on here, but I really liked how she was speaking into that microphone," as he parodied holding the microphone as a phallic symbol. Watters denied his comment was sexual, saying in a statement: "During the break we were commenting on Ivanka's voice and how it was low and steady and resonates like a smooth jazz radio DJ ... This was in no way a joke about anything else."[40] In response to the criticism, Watters was not on the show for two days that week.[41][42]
QAnon comments
In July 2020, Jesse Watters praised the conspiracy theoryQAnon during his show, saying: "they've also uncovered a lot of great stuff when it comes to Epstein and it comes to the deep state. I never saw Q as dangerous as antifa." After public backlash, Watters released a statement saying: "I mentioned the conspiracy group QAnon, which I don't support or believe in. My comments should not be mistaken for giving credence to this fringe platform."[43][44]
Dr. Anthony Fauci comments
Watters attended the Turning Point USA's AmericaFest conference in December 2021, where he advocated for attendees to aggressively confront and question National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Dr. Anthony Fauci about his alleged funding of gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in Wuhan, of the Peoples' Republic of China, saying, "Now you go in for the kill shot. The kill shot? With an ambush? Deadly. Because he doesn't see it coming."[45][46] Dr. Fauci responded by calling Watters' remarks "awful" and said that Watters "should be fired on the spot".[47][48] Fox News Channel indicated their continued support for Watters, saying he "was using a metaphor", and that his comments "had been twisted completely out of context".[45]
Comments about the Muslim world and Arab-Americans
During the November 2, 2023 broadcast of The Five, Watters stated during a segment about the Israel–Hamas war protests that "We've had it with them" referring to the Muslim world. He added, "If you are an Arab American in this country and you ripped down posters of Jewish hostages, American hostages, no! No, no, no. Someone is gonna get punched in the face."[49] This statement was condemned by White House spokesperson Andrew James Bates, saying "These unacceptable remarks come just weeks after the heartbreaking killing of a 6-year-old Palestinian-American child... Fox News owes an apology to every single viewer for this sickening attack on the rights and dignity of their fellow Americans."[50]
Comments about Vice President Kamala D. Harris
During the August 27, 2024 broadcast of The Five, Watters commented on Vice President and former 2024 Democratic Party presidential nominee Kamala Harris: "We don't know who she is. We don't know what she believes. She's going to get paralyzed in the Situation Room while the generals have their way with her."[51] Watters received immediate criticism for this comment, including from his panel colleagues Jeanine Pirro and Dana Perino.[52] A day later, Watters addressed the criticism on-air, stating his comments were misconstrued as being sexual. He further stated he was simply "expressing my opinion that VP Harris' current leadership style could be an issue if elected".[53]
Comments about invading Canada
During a broadcast on 8 January 2025, Watters expressed a desire for a military invasion of Canada amidst the backdrop of United States Presidential nominee Donald Trump's comments about turning Canada into America's 51st state. He stated: "Canada... the fact that they don’t want us to take them over makes me want to invade. I want to quench my imperialist thirst".[54] During an interview with Ontario premier Doug Ford, Watters said, "You say that Americans don’t have a problem with Canadians, and we don’t, but it seems like you have a problem with us. Because if I were a citizen of another country and I was a neighbor of the United States, I would consider it a privilege to be taken over by the United States of America. That’s what everybody else in the world wants — American citizenship. For some reason, that’s repellant to you Canadians, and I find that personally offensive".[55][56][57][58]
Personal life
Watters is registered to vote as a member of the Conservative Party of New York State.[59] He married Noelle Inguagiato in 2009 and they have twin daughters.[60] Noelle filed for divorce in 2018 after Watters admitted to an affair with a producer on his show, Emma DiGiovine who was about 26 at the time. Watters claimed to have begun dating DiGiovine by letting the air out of her vehicle's tires so she would ask him for a ride.[60] In March 2019, Inguagiato and Watters' divorce was finalized. Watters announced his engagement to DiGiovine in August 2019, and they married that December. They had a son together in 2021,[61][62] followed by a daughter in April 2023.
![[icon]](File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg){kind=small}
