Fox News Dominion case: Rupert Murdoch son drops lawsuit against news site as Smartmatic eyes trial
Rupert Murdoch, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and other big names have all avoided being called to testify over 2020 election lies
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Your support makes all the difference.Rupert Murdoch's son has suddenly dropped his lawsuit against Australian news site Crikey days after Fox News agreed to pay Dominion Voting Systems a landmark settlement.
Lachlan Murdoch sued Crikey for defamation last August over a column titled: “Trump is a confirmed unhinged traitor. And Murdoch is his unindicted co-conspirator.”
The suit was dropped on Friday, citing Fox News $787m settlement with Dominion over lies about the 2020 presidential election.
“Crikey has tried to introduce thousands of pages of documents from a defamation case in another jurisdiction, which has now settled,” the statement from Lachlan Murdoch’s legal team said.
“Mr Murdoch remains confident that the court would ultimately find in his favor, however he does not wish to further enable Crikey’s use of the court to litigate a case from another jurisdiction that has already been settled and facilitate a marketing campaign designed to attract subscribers and boost their profits.”
Media pundits are now speculating over the possible fallout from the defamation settlement, with Puck founder Dylan Byers sparking a Twitter frenzy with a column suggesting that Rupert Murdoch could even axe some of his hosts in response to the case.
The Independent has requested comment from Fox News addressing the speculation but there was no immediate change in the network’s programming schedule as of Thursday.
On Tuesday, Fox News reached a settlement with Dominion Voting Systems in its defamation lawsuit moments before opening arguments were about to get under way at trial.
Dominion sued Fox News for defamation, alleging that the network gave a platform to and failed to challenge conspiracy theorists that suggested Dominion was engaged in voter fraud during the 2020 election.
Those conspiracies reportedly damaged Dominion’s business and resulted in employees receiving threats from angry Fox News viewers.
In a last-minute deal, Fox News agreed to pay Dominion $787.5m to put the issue to bed.
Fox News has other legal troubles brewing with Smartmatic revealing what it will take for it to also settle its case against the network.
The voting technology company’s lawyer said on Thursday it won’t accept any settlement smaller than the same $787m payout and will demand a “full retraction” and “apology” from the network.
Fox News finally covers the Dominion trial, fails to mention how much they’re paying to make it go away
Dominion v Fox News: The people and networks still being sued by voting company over election lies
How the almost-trial of Dominion v Fox exploded into a Succession-worthy finale- Don’t be disappointed by the Fox News vs Dominion outcome – this is just the start
Ex-Fox News host says network’s ‘greed and disinformation is a danger to democracy’
Ex-Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson blasted her former employer for placing profits and ratings over truth and media integrity.
Speaking to CNN on Wednesday night, Ms Carlson said the Donald Trump-hating messaging revealed by Dominion in the lawsuit represents the “travesty” of the network.
“Because I think it’s actually a threat to American democracy to promote that kind of misinformation,” she said.
“Let me be clear. There is a huge difference between espousing conservative viewpoints and having an intellectual conversation between conservatives and liberals, which I think is very important — there’s a huge difference between that and telling lies to the American public, and that’s where we have now become in the evolution of Fox News, at least with regard to the 2020 election and January 6th.”
Fox News finally covers the Dominion trial, fails to mention how much they’re paying to make it go away
Fox News has had very little to say about Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6bn defamation lawsuit for nearly the entirety of its existence, but finally deemed the story worth covering on Tuesday when it announced the parties had settled.
In Fox News’ story — which comes in at 256 words, approximately 70 of which are a block quote from a Fox spokesman— we do not learn why the company was sued, just that it was broadly sued for defamation. We also do not learn how much it cost the network to make the trial go away.
(It was $787.5m, in case you missed it.)
Graig Graziosi has the story.
Fox News finally covers the Dominion trial, and it is embarrassing
The settlement robs the public of any further revelations about Fox News’ impact on democracy
Smartmatic reveals what it will take to settle with Fox News
Fox News has other legal troubles brewing with Smartmatic revealing what it will take for it to also settle its case against the network.
The voting technology company’s lawyer said on Thursday it won’t accept any settlement smaller than the same $787m payout and will demand a “full retraction” and “apology” from the network.
“They need to get an apology. They need to get a full retraction,” Smartmatic lawyer Erik Connolly told Jake Tapper.
Murdoch’s son drops lawsuit against Crikey
Rupert Murdoch‘s son has suddenly dropped his lawsuit against Australian news site Crikey days after Fox News agreed to pay Dominion Voting Systems a landmark settlement.
Fox Corp chief executive Lachlan Murdoch filed the Crikey suit last August a day after executives at Crikey’s publisher put their names to an ad in The New York Times inviting Lachlan Murdoch to sue to test the press freedom issue in court.
Murdoch’s lawsuit targeted the publisher, Private Media, its then-managing editor Peter Fray, who was also the website’s editor-in-chief, and Crikey’s political editor, Bernard Keane.
Murdoch claimed he was defamed by Keane’s column about the US congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol building which Crikey published in June last year under the headlines: “Trump is a confirmed unhinged traitor. And Murdoch is his unindicted co-conspirator.”
Murdoch’s lawyer John Churchill said in a statement he had filed a notice of discontinuance in Federal Court on Friday.
“Crikey has tried to introduce thousands of pages of documents from a defamation case in another jurisdiction, which has now settled,” the statement said, referring to the Fox News settlement with Dominion Voting Systems that was announced Tuesday.
“Mr Murdoch remains confident that the court would ultimately find in his favor, however he does not wish to further enable Crikey’s use of the court to litigate a case from another jurisdiction that has already been settled and facilitate a marketing campaign designed to attract subscribers and boost their profits,” Churchill said.
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