In his own messages and depositions, Fox Corp. Chair Rupert Murdoch appeared to worry about going too far in Trump’s direction — but he also wanted to make sure his followers wouldn’t change the channel.
“He had a very large following, and they were probably mostly viewers of Fox, so it would have been stupid,” Murdoch said of Trump.
Fox News also appeared to be driven to push election falsehoods because of the rise of Newsmax, Dominion’s filings suggested. The further-right media outlet had more explicitly embraced Trump’s election falsehoods in the wake of his loss to Biden, leading to a boost in ratings.
Davis issued his summary judgment decision in late March, mostly in Dominion’s favor.
“The evidence developed in this civil proceeding demonstrates that is CRYSTAL clear that none of the Statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true,” he wrote, with his own capitalization.
All Dominion had to persuade a jury of, he ruled, were three things: That Fox News acted with “actual malice”; whether Fox Corp. was also liable; and how much the damages ought to be.
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The weeks leading up to the trial’s scheduled start date have been peppered with twists.
Abby Grossberg, a former producer for Bartiromo and Carlson, filed two lawsuits against Fox News. One of those lawsuits, also filed in Delaware, alleges the company’s lawyers coached her into giving false answers for her deposition for Dominion’s case. She said in court filings that Fox News’s producers should be seen as “activists, not journalists.”
In the week before the trial, Davis admonished Fox’s lawyers after discovering Fox News had withheld documentation indicating Murdoch held a corporate role at Fox News, not just at the parent company, Fox Corp. — an issue that has significant ramifications for whether Fox Corp. could be held liable in the case. He also admonished Fox’s lawyers for appearing to withhold a recording — produced by Grossberg — of Giuliani appearing to tell Bartiromo that some of his claims about Dominion were unproven. Fox has said it has complied with all of its discovery obligations and that Grossberg’s lawsuits are without merit.
Ahead of the expected trial, Fox argued in court filings that Dominion is worth closer to $100 million — far below the $1.6 billion in damages the election technology company claimed. Murdoch also has a track record of settling lawsuits against his companies. A Washington Post analysis found his companies paid out nearly $750 million in settlement funds over the past 13 years, which include settlements over numerous sexual harassment claims against Fox News.
A potentially greater risk to Fox is the lawsuit from Smartmatic that’s working its way through New York state court. Smartmatic asked for $2.7 billion in damages and also has Giuliani as a defendant. Smartmatic’s lawsuit against Powell is progressing through a court in Washington, DC, for jurisdictional reasons.
Dominion also has pending defamation lawsuits against Newsmax and another right-wing media outlet, One America News, both of which face existential risk after being dropped by DirecTV. Along with Smartmatic, it has a smattering of lawsuits against other conspiracy theorists, including MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, pending as well.