Fox news settles defamation case, avoids free speech trial
Fox News has gone and landed themselves a last-minute settlement in a massive defamation case, side-stepping an attention-grabbing trial that could’ve put America‘s free speech rights for the media to the ultimate test.
Judge Eric Davis shared the belting news that the bigwigs had reached a deal after the 12 jurors had already been picked, and the court was prepping for opening arguments in the whopping US$1.6 billion lawsuit lodged by voting machine company Dominion. Davis said…
“The parties have resolved their case.”
This settlement means big boss Rupert Murdoch and top dogs like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity won’t be stepping foot in the witness box.
Things kicked off properly last year when Dominion filed a suit against the right-wing network in March 2021, claiming Fox News was busy promoting Donald Trump’s groundless theory that Dominion’s machines were used to fix the 2020 presidential election which saw him lose out to Joe Biden.
Dominion reckons Fox News spread the fibs even though they supposedly knew they were a load of old codswallop.
The trial was all set to become one of the most important libel cases in US history and had the potential to cause a proper headache for Murdoch’s round-the-clock news empire, as well as hitting the media tycoon square in the wallet.
Dominion said the right-leaning network started backing Trump’s conspiracy theory because they were losing viewers after being the first telly station to call Arizona for Biden, basically saying the Democrat had the presidency in the bag.
But Fox News wasn’t having any of it, denying defamation and insisting they were only sharing Trump’s allegations, not backing them up. They also said they were covered by free speech rights, found in the famous First Amendment of the US Constitution.
This protection means it’s pretty difficult for anyone to win a defamation case stateside.
In the pre-trial meetings, Davis said there was no doubt Fox had broadcast false statements about Dominion.
For Dominion to come out on top, though, they would’ve needed to show that Fox News was acting with real malice – either knowing the info was false, or not giving a monkey’s about whether it was true or not.
This high bar has been a foundation of US media law since way back in 1964.
During the case, Dominion dug up a load of Fox News internal chit-chat that showed some pundits and execs weren’t too keen on Trump’s claims and even admitted they weren’t exactly his biggest fans, despite singing his praises on air. Dominion reckoned this was proof of malice.
An official document revealed that Murdoch himself had called comments by former Trump advisors Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, who was punting Trump’s stolen election story, as “really crazy stuff. And damaging.”
In a case-linked deposition, Murdoch also ‘fessed up to the fact that some hosts had “endorsed” the bogus claim, but he denied the network as a whole had pushed the porkies, according to court documents filed by Dominion.
Star presenter Tucker Carlson also let slip to colleagues that he couldn’t wait to “ignore Trump most nights.” He said…
“I hate him passionately.”
Fox News hit back, accusing Dominion of “cherry-picking and taking quotes out of context.”
Most of the network’s airtime is given to commentators, including a raft of highly-watched prime-time shows hosted by conservative thought leaders.
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