Shep Smith: I wonder, if I stopped delivering the facts, what would go on at Fox News

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Fox News re-signed Smith to a new multiyear contract, the network said on Thursday. It did not specify how many years. He also gave an interview to Time, in which he suggested one of his main reasons for staying was concern about how Fox might replace him.

“I wonder, if I stopped delivering the facts, what would go in its place in this place that is most watched, most listened, most viewed, most trusted?” he told Time. “I don’t know.”

“People who maybe aren’t with us all the time who aren’t regular watchers, maybe there is some sort of confusion about what’s opinion and what’s news, but I think our audience understands the difference and comes to us when they need us,” Smith told Time magazine in its current edition.

“I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that,” he told the magazine. “I don’t work there. I wouldn’t work there. I don’t want to sit around and yell at each other and talk about your philosophy and my philosophy. That sounds horrible to me.”

Smith has been beating this particular drum for years, both defending and complaining about the network.

“Everybody’s got a job to do,” he told HuffPost in October 2016, as he again defended the network’s news coverage.

“Hannity is trying to get conservatives elected. And he wants you to listen to him and believe what he believes,” Smith continued. “And I’m disseminating facts. It’s really apples and teaspoons. What we do is so different. He’s an entertaining guy who has an audience that he serves, and I deliver the news.”

Hannity’s job “is probably easier ? he knows what he thinks and just sticks with it,” Smith added. “This stuff changes all the time.”

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