Fox News is a ratings giant right now and many would venture to guess the network’s executives don’t have a care in the world.
Well, the executives didn’t have a care in the world until now that is.
Fox News execs thought they’d seen the end of one massive legal mess but this judge just drug it all back front-and-center.
While the general election of 2020 was, on its own, a massive story, the story behind Dominion Voting Systems was one that seemed to play out for months in the headlines.
Some of former President Donald Trump’s supporters made false accusations against Dominion saying that the company used its own software to change votes and swing the election in Joe Biden’s favor.
There has never been any evidence to substantiate these claims of voter fraud but it did make for some attention grabbing news for a while.
It also made for a few headaches at the Fox News network.
Sean Hannity repeated the false claims against Dominion on air, which in turn, caused the company to file a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News back in March.
Hannity wasn’t the only one to repeat these statements on air but he is the name most associated with the situation.
Dominion argued that Fox News “sold a false story of election fraud in order to serve its own commercial purposes, severely injuring Dominion in the process.”
Fake News media has become well known for spreading lies but Dominion wasn’t going to let this one slide.
Fox News, of course, filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit stating that the network and its hosts must be able to report both sides of a story.
“A free press must be able to report both sides of a story involving claims striking at the core of our democracy – especially when those claims prompt numerous lawsuits, government investigations, and election recounts,” the motion filed by Fox stated.
Unfortunately for the powers that be at the Fox News network a judge just handed down a rather unwelcome Christmas present.
Eric Davis, a Delaware Superior Court Judge, rejected Fox’s motion to dismiss which now allows Dominion to move forward with the $1.6 billion defamation suit.
Davis wrote, “at this stage, it is reasonably conceivable that Dominion has a claim for defamation per se” and that Dominion’s suit “supports the reasonable inference that Fox either (i) knew its statements about Dominion’s role in election fraud were false or (ii) had a high degree of awareness that the statements were false.”
This entire ordeal isn’t helpful to Fox News.
Should the network lose $1.6 billion could really hurt, but despite the price tag just the bad press isn’t a good look.
Political Animal News will keep you up-to-date on any new developments in this ongoing story.
