White House Slaves Were ‘Well Fed’ And Had ‘Decent Lodgings,’ Says Bill O’Reilly

Bill O’Reilly is under fire for saying White House slaves were “well fed” and had “decent lodgings provided” to them.

O’Reilly is taking some heat for the comments he made after Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia on Monday night, the New York Times reports. The Fox News pundit addressed the first lady’s remarks on Tuesday by saying that slaves who built the White House were “well fed and had decent lodgings provided by the government.”

At the conclusion of his show, The O’Reilly Factor, the highly controversial Fox News host explored the history of the White House going back to George Washington when he chose the site in 1791 to have the building constructed.

O’Reilly called Michelle Obama’s version of what happened “a positive comment,” adding that “the history behind her remark is fascinating.”

He said, “Slaves that worked there were well fed and had decent lodgings provided by the government, which stopped hiring slave labor in 1802. However, the feds did not forbid subcontractors from using slave labor. So, Michelle Obama is essentially correct in citing slaves as builders of the White House, but there were others working, as well.”

Bill O’Reilly says, seriously, that slaves who built White House were “well-fed.” https://t.co/zxkQhRt8ne

— Zach Wolf (@zbyronwolf) July 27, 2016

At the DNC, Mrs. Obama mentioned, as she has on several other occasions, that the White House she wakes up in every day was built by slaves.

“I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves,” she said. “And I watch my daughters, two beautiful, intelligent, black young women, playing with their dogs on the White House lawn.”

Many are chastising Bill O’Reilly for his comments about slaves building the White House. They interpret it as him not seriously understanding how badly slaves were treated in spite of whatever kind of food or sufficient accommodations they may have had from the government.

An Open Letter to Bill O’Reilly From One of the Slaves Who Built the White House https://t.co/nute2fNEyc via @TheRoot

— DL Hughley (@RealDLHughley) July 28, 2016

In a tweet, O’Reilly reacted to the harsh criticism.

“Far left loons distort tip about @FLOTUS statement that slaves built White House. She’s correct & I provided facts. More on The Factor -BO’R,” he wrote.

The White House Historical Association said African Americans did provide “the bulk of the labor that built the White House, the United States Capitol, and other early government buildings.”

Historical records show that slaves worked at the government’s quarry in Aquia, Virginia, and cut stone for the White House walls.

According to Politifact, a stonesman by the name of Collen Williamson “trained enslaved people on the spot at the government’s quarry at Aquia, Va.,” the group wrote on its webpage.

“Enslaved people quarried and cut the rough stone that was later dressed and laid by Scottish masons to erect the walls of the president’s house. The slaves joined a workforce that included local white laborers and artisans from Maryland and Virginia, as well as immigrants from Ireland, Scotland, and other European nations.”

A payroll document from the National Archives and Records Administration/White House Historical Association posted on Politifact shows that the government didn’t own slaves, but they did hire them.

In Jesse J. Holland’s book out this year, The Invisibles: The Untold Story of African American Slaves in the White House, he revealed the tasks that slaves took in building the White House

“With the invention of steam shovels still several years away, these slaves dug for the clay on site with hand shovels, working day and night to get the raw material to the skilled brick makers and at the same time, opening up ground on the site for the space that would become the White House’s foundation and cellar,” Holland wrote.

After Michelle Obama’s speech, Bill O’Reilly defends the conditions of the slaves who built the White Househttps://t.co/NYgHA56yuW

— Rolling Stone (@RollingStone) July 27, 2016

Identities of the slaves and where they originated from have been lost, the author explained.

Michelle Obama’s statements about slaves building the White House are factually true. Holland said after Bill O’Reilly’s segment that it’s unknown how well they were fed or if they had decent lodgings.

[Image via Shutterstock]