O'Reilly compared Irish immigration to enslavement of African-Americans

On the October 4 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, Fox News host Bill O'Reilly equated trans-Atlantic Irish immigration in the 19^th century to the historical enslavement of African-Americans and their forced removal from Africa. The Irish coming to the United States "had to leave the country, just as Africans had to leave -- African-Americans had to leave Africa and come over on a boat and try to make in the New World with nothing," O'Reilly said.

O'Reilly was commenting on a caller's response to his assertion that the prison population is "disproportionately African-American." The caller said that the "reason for that" is "slavery," adding, "If you take someone's language, someone's history, and someone's culture, and then you just release them out into the world, you think they're going to be successful as a people?"