Robert Herring, the CEO of One America News Network, has pulled his offer of a job from former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly.

We are pulling offer to @billoreilly, it could have paid him more than he made at Fox. We wish him luck. #OANN — Robert Herring (@RobHerring) June 20, 2017

OAN is the privately-held news channel launched to give Fox News a run for its viewers and advertisers. Landing the king of cable news could have helped it expand beyond its current 15 million homes.

“We contacted him in April, he sent us to his agent,” Herring told Politco about the proposed deal. “They were to take a meeting in late May. We sent them a solid proposal first week in June. They have not responded, so we pulled our offer so that we can pursue other talent.”

Over the weekend, during the re-start of his live tour, O’Reilly told the audience: “I am starting my own operation. We will go into a studio and it will look like ‘The Factor.’ It’s basically an experiment to see how many people are going to want this service.”

Then on Monday, O’Reilly hinted that a deal with a traditional, ad-supported TV network would be fraught with peril. “The hard truth is that corporations are now intimidated by political hatred. Opinion journalism is under siege and you must have a strong stomach to compete in this arena,” he wrote on billoreilly.com.

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