Kyle Sandilands slams ‘gutless worms’ at News Corp over ‘Special Olympics’ controversy

Kyle Sandilands has hit out at the “gutless worms” and “naughty liar[s]” at News Corp, branding a recent story about him “fake news”.

News Corp ran a story earlier this week about Sandilands and his team discussing “the Special Olympics”.

Sandilands was actually referring to the Paralympics – a different event – and co-host Jackie Henderson also referenced “the real ones” referring to the Olympics.

“Have you been watching the Special Olympics? It’s horrific, some of the things… I saw some poor bloke went for the high jump and then veered right ‘cause he was blind and landed on his arse on the ground… And then when they were playing soccer, the blind people, I was thinking ‘Are you joking?’ They’re throwing themselves on the ground like sausages to block the ball,” Sandilands said on air earlier this week.

He did, alongside newsreader Brooklyn Ross, note the monumental effort the athletes go to in their endeavours.

“I think good on you, I love the spirit of the contest… but I feel that Jesus, Christ, that’s a big effort,” Sandilands said.

Sandilands also cautioned Ross about being too emphatic in his support of the Paralympians.

“You can be nice to the handicapped [athletes], but you don’t have to compare them to the non-handicapped. You don’t have to lift them up to be better than the non-handicapped.”

News Corp then ran a story, furthering the controversy and quoting Greens Senator Jordan Steele-John who said Sandilands comments were “abhorrent and ableist”, called on the broadcaster to apologise and suggested he should be sacked.

On this morning’s show, Sandilands suggested the controversy and outrage was manufactured.

“If you’ve got no news, write about someone else who’s not going to follow it up and chase it up and find out what really happened, because I’ve got a lot of time on my hands and lots of money to make things happen. So no one complained, there was no big outrage. It’s a lying, fake news story right there in The Daily Telegraph. Fake headline.Fake story.Fake outrage…. It’s unbelievable that these people are allowed to lie constantly about people and get paid by a multinational company and nothing happens about it,” he said.

He branded News Corp “gutless worms” and said the article’s author, Mitchell Van Himrigh, was a “naughty liar” who was not a serious journalist.

“I dared say the words ‘Special Olympics’ instead of, what’s the word? … [Paralympics]. How am I supposed to know the difference? I don’t follow any sport. There’s a big story in here. Let me tell you the real story about what happened, because I’ve already found out through all my Government friends. Some journalist…. they’ve written it here… and here’s the lying headline, and you’re a big company, News Corp, you should make sure you don’t lie in your newspapers. ‘Sandilands slammed for Paralympic swipe’. Now I’m not slammed by anyone except the one Greens senator who the journalist rang up and asked to comment then sent the Senator the audio so he could comment. So straight off the bat, it’s a bullshit story,” he sad.

“I said all these things, but it wasn’t negative towards the contesting. I just said I saw some stuff and I was shocked… it was quite the eye-opener that thing. But they make the article sound like I’m very anti anyone with a handicap.”

Sandilands also issued some, likely tongue-in-cheek, threats to the journalist about sending some “Tongan mates” to see the journalist to clarify the matter.