From Headlines to Courtrooms: Inside the Fox News Defamation Case

By Emma Galgano

simply reporting claims made by Trump and his supporters. Thus, they are not liable.

Dominion Voting Systems sued Fox News for $1.6 billion after claiming that Fox repeatedly aired allegations that the company’s voting machines were rigged against former President Donald Trump in 2020, knowing that the accusations were false. However, the two entities settled, forcing Fox News to pay almost $800 million, making it one of the biggest financial settlements in a defamation case.

According to DominionVoting.com, Dominion Voting Systems Corporation is a company that produces and sells electronic voting hardware and software, including voting machines and tabulators, in Canada and the United States. Dominion, during the lengthy and embarrassing trial, produced numerous counts of evidence that prominent people at Fox stated false claims over the Trump election. Fox hosts, such as Lou Dobbs and Jeanine Pirro, are some of the many that endorsed false claims of election fraud.

Rebecca Tushnet, the Frank Stanton Professor of First Amendment Law at Harvard Law School, de- scribed Dominion’ss evidence as a “very strong” filing that “clearly lays out the difference between what Fox was saying publicly and what top people at Fox were privately admitting.”

According to Politico, Dominion argued that one of the main motives for Fox reporting conspiracy theories was because there was a panic about losing viewers to rivals like Newsmax.

In response, Dominion stated that its brands and employees were constantly harassed by MAGA supporters. Due to this, they sought $1.6 billion in damages.

The challenging part of the case for Dominion was the libel law, which made it difficult for some plaintiffs to prove defamation by news outlets. They have to prove not only that the information reported was incorrect but also that the news organization acted with “reckless disregard” about whether it was true or not.

As reported by The New York Times, in response, Fox News stated they were

In pre-trial, Fox founder Rupert Murdoch was brought to the stand. Under oath, he admitted that the 2020 election, won by President Joseph Biden, was free and fair: “The election was not stolen.” Some other highlights include Tucker Carlson wishing for Trump to vanish from the national stage, even as he publicly embraced him: “I hate him passionately.”

Opening arguments were scheduled to start at around 1:30 p.m. After a twohour delay, Judge Eric Davis returned to stun a packed courtroom shortly before 4 p.m. and stated, “The parties have resolved their case.”

Fox stated they settled and agreed to pay $787.5 million, and there did not appear to be any provision in the settlement deal requiring any apology from Fox. While many news outlets report that this could economically hurt Fox, in their most quarterly earnings report, Fox claimed $14 billion in revenue last year.

One week after the settlement, Tucker Carlson, the highest-rated single host at Fox News, and Fox News split ways. Carlson propelled himself to stardom in recent years by being a top promoter of conspiracy theories and radical rhetoric used as evidence during the defamation case.

During the trial, several counts of evidence of Carlson’s vulgar text messages in which he said he “hated [Donald] Trump passionately” and called Sidney Powell, a lawyer for the former president who was spreading false election information, a liar

According to the Wall Street Journal, Carlson found out about his firing 10 minutes before it was announced. Discussions of firing Carlson began when a lawsuit was filed by Abby Grossberg, a former senior booking producer on Carlson’s show, who claims she faced sexism and a hostile work environment.

However, the settlement with Dominion affirmed Rupert Murdoch’s son and Fox Corp CEO Lachlan Murdoch and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott’s decision to fire Carlson. Fox said, “We thank him for his service to the network as a host and before that as a contributor.”

The settlement with Fox News sets legal history as one of the largest defamation payouts in American history. This could embolden Dominion as it continues to defend its reputation. The company has several pending cases against public figures, including Mike Lindell, the MyPillow executive, and news outlets likeNewsmax.