DE - Dominion Voting Systems vs. Fox News, $1.6B Defamation Trial for 2020 election lies, 17 Apr 2023 *Settled $787m* + add’l trials

[Elliot_Alderson]

Now that I know Fox lies, I'll never watch it again.

Were you watching it before? I used to put it on sometimes for the lolz but then I decided I don't want to give them more ratings than they already get. Seriously, A LOT of people watch these shows (Hannity, idiot Tucket, etc) JMO

 

[ilovewings]

Doubtful. Dominion and Fox are 2 sides of the same coin, JMO. Dominion doesn't care if Fox lies to the public. They only care if Fox lies about Dominion.

If Fox finds some other way to make false claims about "rigged elections" that doesn't involve the voting machine companies, they're ok with that. JMO

Dominion filed the suit seeking damages for the lies told By Fox that
Defamed their company--the settlement figure represents those damages-
the suit has nothing to do with the public.

 

[MrsWatson]

Fox and Dominion settle for $787.5m in defamation lawsuit over election lies

Agreement reached after the jury was sworn in on Tuesday morning after lengthy delay to start of opening statements

www.theguardian.com

Neither party immediately disclosed the terms of the settlement other than the dollar amount, and attorneys for Dominion declined to answer questions about whether it requires Fox to issue a retraction or a formal apology.

 

[MyBelle]

Were you watching it before? I used to put it on sometimes for the lolz but then I decided I don't want to give them more ratings than they already get. Seriously, A LOT of people watch these shows (Hannity, idiot Tucket, etc) JMO

I watched it occasionally before but never again.

 

[Smelly Squirrel]

It sounds like all Fox has to admit is in that tepid statement they gave. "We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false"

I'm sure Dominion is happy with the money they got, several times more than the company's worth, but I don't see Fox News changing their behavior much if at all. We shall see.

 

[Stunned]

The only time I was in it’s presence was arguing with my father to turn it off!

 

[bestill]

I doubt that Fox will issue more than the statement they did today. They can't apologize because they have more pending litigation. They'll just sweep it under the rug and move on. The other networks will make sure that it's covered.

To be candid I don't know where to go for truthful news anymore, it's all slanted in one direction or another. I remember when I was a teen we watched the evening news every night and believed what we watched. The days of Peter Jennings and Walter Cronkite are over. Sad JMO

 

[bestill]

So what happens to the Special Master appointed by the Judge? Does all of that go away now that it's settled?

 

[anneg]

Well, the one good thing, IMO, is that @JerseyGirl and @Niner don't have to find the time to cover this trial after all. If it had proceeded, it could have been time-consuming to keep up. Thanks to all who have been posting here. Now I'm bracing for more trials!

 

[Sillybilly]

Actually, as settlement agreements go, they usually contain a clause that the settlement is in no way an admission of guilt or responsibility, so in a way I'm a bit surprised that it even contained that degree of admission by Fox. Also, the dollar amount is usually confidential, so there was some really good lawyering happening for not only the watered down acknowledgement / admission by Fox AND the dollar figure being released.

The public good that came of this is to let folks know they can't trust FOX, and to those who still hold firmly to the "stolen election" theory to reconsider that some of their beliefs were based on lies.

JMO

It sounds like all Fox has to admit is in that tepid statement they gave. "We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false"

I'm sure Dominion is happy with the money they got, several times more than the company's worth, but I don't see Fox News changing their behavior much if at all. We shall see.co

 

[crussell821]

No apology. No admission that their enthusiastic participation in the acrimony and division their coverage, based on lies that they knew were lies, fostered. And the line about the continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards, are they taking the piss? Is that sarcasm?

Great, so nothing to see here then I guess. Nothing will change and they’ll continue to lie and divide the country for funsies. MOO

 

[ilovewings]

Great, so nothing to see here then I guess. Nothing will change and they’ll continue to lie and divide the country for funsies. MOO

That is about right!

 

[sds71]

@BillWeirCNN
·
$787,500,000 is the opener. Dominion still has pending lawsuits against Newsmax and OAN, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Mike Lindell of pillow fame and Fox News is being sued by Smartmatic for $2.7 billion.

 

[SouthAussie]

Dominion legal team leaving the courtroom says FOX settlement was more than $787 million. Says “lies matter.”

https://twitter.com/x/status/1648420841993150464

Good that the amount was more than $787 million. When I was reading potential outcomes from a trial, the projected award was about $380,000-ish.

May Fox now have a bit of a think about how expensive any future lying may be.

 

[ilovewings]

Let's face it, most of us are probably disappointed with the settlement. We were looking forward to seeing Fox anchors squirming on the stand while trying to defend their lies on the witness stand. We wanted to see them stammer when emails were shown to them on cross examination that showed they were lying to their viewers when they screamed the election was rigged, knowing that was a big fat lie! So we are denied that

You can't blame Dominion for settling: the standard for success in a defamation lawsuit is very very high- and even if they won Fox would have appealed and held up any verdict award for years.

Still, I will miss seeing those liars squirm------ oh well-----

 

[Kavya01]

I doubt that Fox will issue more than the statement they did today. They can't apologize because they have more pending litigation. They'll just sweep it under the rug and move on. The other networks will make sure that it's covered.

To be candid I don't know where to go for truthful news anymore, it's all slanted in one direction or another. I remember when I was a teen we watched the evening news every night and believed what we watched. The days of Peter Jennings and Walter Cronkite are over. Sad JMO

Reuters and Associated Press (AP) are very factual. BBC News mostly as well.

 

[TootsieFootsie]

Fox Corp. just released a statement: “We are pleased to have reached a settlement of our dispute with Dominion Voting Systems. We acknowledge the court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false. This settlement reflects Fox’s continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards. We are hopeful that our decision to resolve this dispute with Dominion amicably, instead of the acrimony of a divisivThae trial, allows the country to move forward from these issues.”

That's like hinting that there were other claims that were true.
Not much of an apology

 

[JerseyGirl]

Fox News' settlement with Dominion doesn't mean the risk of embarrassment is over, with Smartmatic saying it 'remains committed' to its own defamation case against the network

"Smartmatic remains committed to clearing its name, recouping the significant damage done to the company, and holding Fox accountable..." an attorney said.

www.businessinsider.com

In a statement on Tuesday, an attorney for Smartmatic credited Dominion's litigation with shedding light on Fox News' internal deliberations — and promised more of the same.

"Dominion's litigation exposed some of the misconduct and damage caused by Fox's disinformation campaign," J. Erik Connolly, an attorney at Benesch, Friedlander, Coplan & Aronoff said in a statement. "Smartmatic will expose the rest."

The company is seeking $2.7 billion in damages. In addition to Powell and Giuliani, its lawsuit lists Fox News anchors Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro as defendants; Lou Dobbs, a host who left the network in 2021, is also named.

In February, a New York appeals court, in a 5-0 decision, rejected Fox News' effort to have the case dismissed and ruled that Giuliani and Pirro could remain as defendants. It also opened the door to adding Fox News' parent company, the Fox Corporation, as a defendant. No trial date has been set.

Smartmatic's case against Powell was last year moved to a court in Washington, DC.

"Smartmatic remains committed to clearing its name, recouping the significant damage done to the company, and holding Fox accountable for undermining democracy," Connolly said.

 

[Betty P]

That's like hinting that there were other claims that were true.
Not much of an apology

Just like that nasty man who was sued into oblivion for his horrendous conspiracy theories about the Sandy Hook school massacre of those little children. No matter how many times he lost those lawsuits, he would still go back on the air and claim his evil conspiracy theories were true.

Had to look it up, his name is AJ. He made millions of dollars every month peddling stuff he admitted was false. Fox will do the same thing, because its very profitable to keep lying. JMO

Connecticut jury orders Alex Jones to pay nearly $1 billion to Sandy Hook families

The award is the largest the Texas conspiracy theorist has been ordered to pay as part of three defamation lawsuits against him for falsely claiming that the 2012 school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, was a hoax.

www.texastribune.org

 

[Veronica Sawyer]

Do news stations not have lawyers at the ready to shut conversations or topics like these down before they reach the point of no return? Is that not also in large part what the earpieces anchors/hosts wear during broadcast are for? And even if lawyers weren’t on hand to hear all that was being said live in real-time you would think they would’ve given Fox a warning after the first segment. That’s what I had always assumed to be protocol in broadcast anyway.

I vaguely recall around the time of all this happening one of the hosts (Tucker, probably) repeatedly said Fox had been trying to get a Dominion rep on the show to discuss the claims and they wouldn’t return their calls or something to that effect. So were they taunting Dominion as a play to get them on the show or did they believe that because Dominion hadn’t been willing to appear on the show (a rep might’ve appeared at some point after I checked out on the absurd saga for good) to dispute the claims that those claims were somehow true and therefore they could keep the conversation going?

It’s baffling really. Like why even have a legal department? Hopefully the nearly billion dollar settlement they have to pay out serves as a sobering lesson for all I guess.

More than Fox though I wanted the lawyer (Sidney Powell) who originated the claims to pay. Obviously I wouldn’t expect her to be able to pay much monetarily but she should maybe lose her license to practice after peddling lies.

/ JMO