FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2015 file photo, host Bill O'Reilly of "The O'Reilly Factor" on the Fox News Channel, poses for photos in the set in New York. While advertisers may be fleeing Bill O'Reilly's "no... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2015 file photo, host Bill O'Reilly of "The O'Reilly Factor" on the Fox News Channel, poses for photos in the set in New York. While advertisers may be fleeing Bill O'Reilly's "no spin zone" on Fox News Channel, viewers are remaining loyal. "The O'Reilly Factor" averaged 3.71... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2015 file photo, host Bill O'Reilly of "The O'Reilly Factor" on the Fox News Channel, poses for photos in the set in New York. While advertisers may be fleeing Bill O'Reilly's "no spin zone" on Fox News Channel, viewers are remaining loyal. "The O'Reilly Factor" averaged 3.71... (Associated Press) FILE - In this Oct. 1, 2015 file photo, host Bill O'Reilly of "The O'Reilly Factor" on the Fox News Channel, poses for photos in the set in New York. While advertisers may be fleeing Bill O'Reilly's "no... (Associated Press) 
 
 LOS ANGELES (AP) — Bill O'Reilly is taking a vacation from his Fox News Channel show amid sponsor defections triggered by sexual harassment allegations. 
 
 Announcing the break at the end of Tuesday's show, O'Reilly made a point of saying it was planned and long in the works. He said he will return April 24. 
 
 Around this time of year, "I grab some vacation, because it's spring and Easter time. Last fall, I booked a trip that should be terrific," he said. 
 
 His vacation announcement comes as about 60 companies said they won't advertise on his show. The exodus followed a recent report in The New York Times that five women were paid a total of $13 million to keep quiet about harassment allegations. 
 
 The amount of advertising time by paying customers on "The O'Reilly Factor" has been cut by more than half since the Times report, according to an analysis issued Tuesday by Kantar Media. 
 
 But O'Reilly, cable TV news' most popular personality, hasn't been abandoned by his audience. His show averaged 3.7 million viewers over five nights last week, up 12 percent from the 3.3 million he averaged the week before and up 28 percent compared to the same week in 2016. 
 
 "O'Reilly Factor" drew an average of just under 4 million viewers for the first three months of 2017, his biggest quarter ever in the show's 20-year history. 
 
 On Tuesday, the host offered his audience some general advice. 
 
 "If you can possibly take two good trips a year, it will refresh your life. We all need R&R. Put it to good use," O'Reilly said. 
 
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 Online: 
 
 https://www.billoreilly.com 
 
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 AP Television Writer David Bauder in New York contributed to this report. ||||| Was tonight Bill O’Reilly‘s last show? 
 
 That’s a possibility according to New York magazine’s Gabriel Sherman — whose previous reporting on the network has been mostly accurate, including much of his reporting leading up to the departure of former Fox News head Roger Ailes. 
 
 In a report for the magazine’s website Tuesday night, Sherman cited four unnamed sources at the network as saying “there’s talk that tonight’s show could be his last.” 
 
 O’Reilly announced during the broadcast that he was taking a vacation. But Sherman cites two “highly-placed” sources as saying 21st Century FOX CEO James Murdoch, son of Rupert Murdoch, wants O’Reilly out. 
 
 The highly-rated host has been under fire over the past few weeks amid reports of paid settlements to multiple women who accused the top-rated host of sexual harassment. 
 
 A Fox News spokesperson refuted Sherman’s report, telling Mediaite that O’Reilly’s vacation was preplanned and that the embattled host will return on April 24. 
 
 [image via screengrab] 
 
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 Follow Joe DePaolo (@joe_depaolo) on Twitter 
 
 Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com ||||| On vacation. 
 
 Embattled Fox News host Bill O’Reilly announced tonight that he is taking a vacation. O’Reilly’s decision to go off the air in the midst of a sexual harassment scandal and advertiser boycott arguably has the appearance of a suspension, but O’Reilly worked to dispel that notion. He announced that he’d scheduled his trip “last fall” — well before the New York Times reported he paid $13 million to settle harassment claims. A Fox News spokesperson confirmed O’Reilly will return on April 24. 
 
 Here’s how O’Reilly talked about his vacation on the show Tuesday night. 
 
 But according to four network sources, there’s talk inside Fox News that tonight’s show could be his last. Lawyers for the law firm Paul, Weiss, hired last summer by 21st Century Fox to investigate Roger Ailes, are currently doing a “deep dive” investigation into O’Reilly’s behavior. They’re focused now on sexual harassment claims by O’Reilly guest Wendy Walsh after she reported her claims via the company’s anonymous hotline. 
 
 Fox News co-president Bill Shine has been working hard to keep O’Reilly, sources said. But O’Reilly’s future is in the hands of the Murdochs. “It’s up to the family,” the senior Fox News staffer said. The Murdochs are presently divided over how to handle it. Two highly placed Fox News sources say 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch would like O’Reilly to be permanently taken off the air, while his father, Rupert, and older brother, Lachlan, are more inclined to keep him. (A spokesperson for the Murdochs declined to comment.) 
 
 That dynamic — James pushing for swift action, while Rupert resists — played out last summer in the Ailes scandal. James, of course, got his way with Ailes. With more than three dozen advertisers boycotting O’Reilly, Fox staffers speculate the same may happen to O’Reilly, perhaps as early as during his vacation. “The assumption is that he’ll exit in a non-embarrassing way,” one senior Fox News staffer told me.
– Amid sexual harassment allegations and an exodus of advertisers from The O'Reilly Factor, Bill O'Reilly is on vacation—or, as the Washington Post puts it, on "vacation." In a report that Fox has refuted, New York's Gabriel Sherman says several high-placed sources have told him that Tuesday night's show will be O'Reilly's last. Sherman says his Fox sources have told him that in a Murdoch family split similar to the one that preceded the departure of Roger Ailes last year, Fox CEO James Murdoch wants O'Reilly gone for good, while brother Lachlan and father Rupert Murdoch want him to stay. Sherman says lawyers who looked into Ailes' behavior are now taking a "deep dive" into list of allegations against O'Reilly. Mediaite notes that Sherman's sources have been spot-on about Fox developments the past, though a Fox spokesperson says O'Reilly's vacation was planned before the allegations surfaced and he will be back on the air April 24. O'Reilly said the same when he announced the vacation at the end of his show Tuesday night, the AP reports. "We all need R&R," said O'Reilly, who told viewers he usually takes a break around this time of year and he booked this trip last fall. This year, The O'Reilly Factor has had its best viewing figures in its 20-year history, though around 60 companies have pulled ads from the show, which now only has about half as much advertising time as it did a few weeks ago, the Post reports.