Former Fox News chairman Rupert Murdoch admitted under oath in a recent deposition that the network aired conspiracy theories suggesting the 2020 election had been stolen for the sole purpose of protecting their financial bottom line, according to documents released Monday.
In one section of Murdoch’s deposition, which was taken as part of a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems, the Fox chief says his network wasn’t interested in red or blue, and was instead focused on “green.”
“Rupert confirmed that he could tell FNN (Fox News Network) to stop running (MyPillow founder Mike) Lindell’s advertisements, ‘But I’m not about to.’ … and when asked why Fox continues to give a platform to Lindell — who continues to this day to spout lies about Dominion — Murdoch agreed that ‘It is not red or blue, it is green.’ … Lindell brought—and brings— Fox a lot of green. He also predictably brought the same lies about Dominion to Fox’s viewers that had been peddled on Fox’s ‘alternate reality machine’ for months.”
The Washington Post notes that in another section of the Monday filing from Dominion, current Fox chairman Lachlan Murdoch was worried that coverage of Trump rally after the election had been called for President Joe Biden had been too negative, which could cost Fox financially:
“News guys have to be careful how they cover this rally,” he told Fox News C.E.O. Suzanne Scott. “So far some of the side comments are slightly anti, and they shouldn’t be. The narrative should be this is a huge celebration of the president.”
Elsewhere in the deposition, Rupert Murdoch admits that some of his primetime hosts did indeed endorse nonsensical conspiracy theories about the election.
Question: “About Fox endorsing the narrative of a stolen election; correct?”
Murdoch: “No. Some of our commentators were endorsing it.”
Question: “About their endorsement of a stolen election?”
Murdoch: “Yes. They endorsed.”
In reaction to the Monday court filing, Fox released a statement:
“Dominion’s lawsuit has always been more about what will generate headlines than what can withstand legal and factual scrutiny, as illustrated by them now being forced to slash their fanciful damages demand by more than half a billion dollars after their own expert debunked its implausible claims. Their summary judgment motion took an extreme, unsupported view of defamation law that would prevent journalists from basic reporting and their efforts to publicly smear FOX for covering and commenting on allegations by a sitting President of the United States should be recognized for what it is: a blatant violation of the First Amendment.”
Fox is also facing a multibillion-dollar defamation lawsuit from Smartmatic, an electronic voting systems company.
