Fox News knew it was spreading false claims of voter fraud, voting company says

“Fox News has fulfilled its obligation to provide comprehensive information and to comment fairly,” the company said in a statement. “Some hosts were skeptical about the President’s claims; others looked at her hopefully; all recognized them as deeply newsworthy.”

Fox News said in a statement that “Dominion’s summary judgment motion takes an extreme and unsupported view of the defamation law and is based on a statement of facts that has no basis in the records.”

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A judge denied Fox Corp’s motion to dismiss in June 2022, finding Dominion was correct in asserting that Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch may have acted with “actual malice” in directing the network to spread the conspiracy theory. The judge noted a report that Rupert Murdoch spoke to Trump “and told him he had lost” days after the election.

On Thursday, Dominion said internal Fox emails and text messages support its claim that the network swung to the conspiracy theory to retain and attract viewers, who were upset when Fox became the first network to start counting votes on election night called in Arizona for Biden.

“Getting creamed by CNN!” Rupert Murdoch wrote to Fox News executive Suzanne Scott. “I guess our viewers don’t want to see it.”

Carlson texted his producer with a warning: “Do the executives understand how much credibility and trust we’ve lost with our audiences? We’re really playing with fire… an alternative like Newsmax could be devastating for us.”

It was at this point that Maria Bartiromo began harboring Powell, one of the architects of the conspiracy theory, although she received emails from the attorney citing only one source for her theory — someone who stated that she received her information, doing something “like time travel in a semi-conscious state,” which allows her to “see what others don’t see and hear what others don’t hear,” according to the filing.

“In testifying, Bartiromo admitted that this email is ‘no evidence’ of Powell’s claims and was in fact ‘nonsense’ and ‘inherently unreliable,'” Dominion said in the filing.

Murdoch chimed in on the conspiracy theory while listening to an unhinged news conference by Powell and then-Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani on November 19, 2020, who was attempting to explain the alleged election scheme.

“Watch Giuliani!” Murdoch, who at times attended editorial meetings twice a day, said in the subject line of an email. “Really crazy stuff,” he wrote. “And harmful.”

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Murdoch told Scott on Jan. 5, 2021 that there had been suggestions that the network’s prime-time coverage should indicate that “the election is over and Joe Biden has won,” and that such a statement “would go a long way toward helping.” to stop the Trump myth that the election was stolen.” That didn’t happen.

“Despite internal recognition that the election was over, Fox has not retracted its claims about Dominion,” the voting machine manufacturer’s filing reads. “Instead, it further defamed Dominion. To date, Fox has never retracted the false statements it made about Dominion.”

Fox News anchor Dana Perino described the conspiracy theory in texts and emails at the time as “total bullshit,” “insane,” and “nonsense,” according to the filing. Chris Stirewalt, who was politics editor at Fox News during the election, testified that he believed that until November 7, 2020, “no one could believe that Donald Trump actually won the election.”

Fox News and several of its figures are also facing a lawsuit from Smartmatic Corp, a Dominion competitor that has also been falsely accused on the air of rigging the election against Trump. A New York City appeals court this week upheld a ruling denying Fox’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, and reinstated the dismissed claims against Rudy Giuliani and Fox News personality Jeanine Pirro.

Separately, Fox News on Thursday filed new details on a countersuit against Dominion accusing the company of violating a New York law that restricts free speech through litigation. Central to this allegation is Fox’s allegation that Dominion is seeking excessive damages in favor of company and private equity owner Staple Street Capital Partners in the case. Evidence gathered in the discovery process supports this, Fox claims.

“Dominion cannot possibly suffer damage of this magnitude, let alone such damage, as a result of a single news outlet reporting a story that was reported in media around the world. Neither has it,” Fox said. “Documents produced at the discovery show Dominion is in a solid financial position, with significant cash holdings, no debt and a steady return on Staple Street’s investment.”

Bloomberg