Fox News has been exposed as a dishonest organization terrified of its own audience
Fox News Disobeyed Dominion: What Should We Expect to Tell Fox News After The Fox News Confirmation of the 1964 US Supreme Court Decision
After the presidential contest had ended, the Fox News audience disobeyed the channel and listened to Trump. Fox News lost part of its audience, while Newsmax gained more viewers.
The Fox statement called Dominion’s stance “extreme,” citing free speech concerns, and characterized the voting-tech company’s legal position as “a blatant violation of the First Amendment” that would “prevent journalists from basic reporting.”
A judge in Delaware affirmed that the contracts should be given to one of the parties.
Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud were among the most muscular arguments made by Dobbs in the air. He was forced out of Fox the day after Smartmatic filed its own $2.7 billion defamation case against the network.
Keller pointed out that a host or producer of pre-scripting material for the show that is attached to a specific channel’s broadcast is different than a network executive.
Meanwhile, fixated on the erosion of viewers to smaller right-wing rivals, Fox News executives purged senior journalists who were fixated on reflecting the facts. Scott wrote a note against Sammon, the former Washington managing editor of Fox News. Scott wrote Sammon did not understand “the impact to the brand and the arrogance” in projecting Arizona for Biden, saying it was Sammon’s job “to protect the brand.”
Nelson, the Dominion attorney, retorted by citing a document obtained from Fox that “talks about the daily editorial meeting that occurs, including almost all of these executives that we’re looking at right now.”
Fox News claims that they were unfairly maligned because of some of the statements that Dominion had made. It is hard to see how this instructions to the network news chief would be appropriate.
If Fox acted with reckless disregard of the truth, as defined in the 1964 US Supreme Court decision, then it has to be shown that they knew what they were doing was false.
No one at Fox would directly comment on Baker and Glasser’s assertions, other than Baier, who released a statement taking some issue with how his objections were framed. A technical glitch in the Fox control room caused the delay of the full White House win for Joe Biden, according to a person with knowledge of Fox’s election coverage.
In hosting Fox’s first post-election interview with Trump that November, Bartiromo echoed Trump’s disproven allegations of electoral fraud, saying, “This is disgusting, and we cannot allow America’s election to be corrupted.” She told viewers in mid-December that “an intel source” told her that Trump had won the election. Bartiromo, officially designated as a news anchor, never returned to explain on what grounds the source made that statement. She had roots in the news side of Fox as opposed to an opinion host and now she’s not an anchor.
In December of 2020, Dobbs said that Trump’s opponents within the government had committed treason, and that Republican office holders might have been guilty of criminal behavior if they had tried to uphold Biden’s victory. His departure from the network was immediately announced the day after another election software company filed its own defamation lawsuit against Fox for false accusations of fraud. That case is not as far along in the process.
Dominion’s legal team asked the court to compel additional testimony from Pirro late last month, arguing that after Fox invoked a reporter’s privilege to shield her from some questions during her deposition. There is no public information on the ruling on whether or not to return for questioning.
Fox News has repeatedly defended its conduct by invoking the importance of American free speech principles bound up in the First Amendment, saying the Smartmatic and Dominion cases are attempts to chill independent reporting and commentary.
Murdoch told the jury that Fox was trying to call out the fact that conspiracy theories were false, while still spreading the conspiracy theories of their own.
In that case, Murdoch is accusing a much smaller media outlet of defamation. He has forced the site to pay out for highly critical commentary several times previously; Crikey says it intends to use the suit as a test case for recent changes in libel law in that country. In Australia, legal cover for media outlets is less than in the U.S.
The Fox News Insider’s Brief Against Pseudosceptics in the Air: Why We Don’t Have a Light on Fox News
Jason Koerner/Getty Images; Jason Koerner/Getty Images; Carolyn Kaster/AP; Alex Brandon/AP; Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images; Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images
Off the air, the network’s stars, producers and executives expressed contempt for those same conspiracies, calling them “mind-blowingly nuts,” “totally off the rails” and “completely bs” – often in far earthier terms.
The network’s top primetime stars – Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity – texted contemptuously of the claims in group chats, but also denounced colleagues pointing that out publicly or on television.
The Trump campaign attorney Sidney Powell was called a bit nuts by Ingraham. Carlson, who famously demanded evidence from Powell on the air, privately used a vulgar epithet for women to describe her. A top network programming executive wrote privately that he did not believe the shows of Carlson, Hannity and Jeanine Pirro were credible sources of news.
And Murdoch isn’t the only person in leadership who seemingly doesn’t view Fox News as a straight-shooting news organization (which, to be clear, it most definitely is not). In the Dominion filings, former House Speaker turned Fox Corporation board member Paul Ryan wrote the Murdochs, “[T]he sooner we can put down the echoes of falsehoods from our side, the faster we can get onto principled loyal opposition.”
Sean Hannity told Carlson and Ingraham that the election destroyed a brand that took 25 years to build.
Fox News host Neil Cavuto was attacked by his colleagues for removing his show from a presentation on fraud by a White House spokeswoman after she made again false claims of fraud. McEnany is a host on Fox News.
The material presented in the 178-page brief shows no illusions that there were heft to the allegations of election fraud, even among the most fervent supporters of the Trump campaign.
Raj Shah, once a White House aide to President Trump, was part of a group that warned top corporate leaders about a brand threat after they were refused a McEnany’s press briefing on voter fraud.
In a separate filing, also released to the public on Thursday, the cable network’s attorneys say Dominion’s ten-figure request for damages is designed to “generate headlines” and to enrich the company’s controlling owner, the private equity fund Staple Street Capital Partners.
A Tweet from the Chief Political Anchor of News Corp. after the departure of B.S. Baier on Nov. 5, 2020: Why Fox News Shouldn’t Accrete about the Truth
On Nov. 5, 2020, just days after the election, Bret Baier, the network’s chief political anchor texted a friend: “[T]here is NO evidence of fraud. None. Allegations – stories. You can post on social media websites such as Twitter. The Bulls.
Sammon declined to speak on the subject of his departure due to the terms of his departure.
The legal document made public on Thursday showed that executives and talk hosts were trashing a lot of lies perpetuated by former President Donald Trump and his supporters.
The network allowed the lies to take hold of it’s air, despite privately acknowledging the realitory, because executives and hosts were afraid that telling the truth would cause people to stop tuning out.
A Times account last week described the depth of the situation, which began in a text chain with Mr. Carlson and continued with a conversation with Ms. Ingraham and Mr. Hannity. Mr. Carlson said to get her fired. He added: ‘It needs to stop immediately, like tonight. It is hurting the company. The stock price has gone down. Not a joke.’ Ms. Heinrich had deleted her tweet by the next morning.”
Carlson told Hannity to get her fired. “Seriously What the f**k? I’m actually shocked. It needs to stop immediately, like tonight. It’s measurably hurting the company. The stock price is not what it was. Not a joke.”
“Hannity is getting close to the line with his commentary and guests tonight”, warned Dinh to Murdoch, Scott and the top deputy. The next day, Rupert Murdoch warned that if Trump refused to concede graciously, “we should watch Sean especially and others don’t sound the same.”
According to the filing, Fox News had been courting Mike Lindell, founder of MyPillow, a major advertiser for the Trump campaign. Scott sent Lindell a personal note and a gift while encouraging Fox shows to book him as a guest to “get ratings.”
Rupert Murdoch and the Fox News Defamation of a U.N. Sen. Lachlan Murdoch: How his family and corporate advisers saw the story
“There will be a lot of noise and confusion generated by Dominion and their opportunistic private equity owners, but the core of this case remains about freedom of the press and freedom of speech, which are fundamental rights afforded by the Constitution and protected by New York Times v. Sullivan,” the network said.
Yup, Fox hosts and the Murdoch family were OK with discrediting the core engine of America’s democracy — our ability to peacefully and legitimately transfer power — if it would hold their audience and boost their stock.
I’ve never met Haley, but from afar it seemed that she had a reasonably good story to tell — a successful South Carolina governor from 2011 to 2017, Trump’s first U.N. ambassador and the daughter of Indian immigrants. Her mother, Raj, studied law at the University of New Delhi, and after immigrating to South Carolina, earned a master’s degree in education and became a local public-school teacher. Her father was a professor at Voorhees College for 29 years, after earning his doctorate from the University of British Columbia. On the side, they even opened a clothing boutique.
Murdoch wanted to distinguish between the two. When asked whether Fox News embraced the idea of election fraud, he pointed instead to his own stars: “No. Some of our commentators were endorsing it.”
Murdoch was asked if he could have told the CEO and stars of Fox News to stop giving airtime to Giuliani. “I could have,” Murdoch said. I didn’t.
To counter the defense, the company brought the words of Murdoch and his top corporate advisers.
Emails that lawyers for Dominion have used to build their defamation case give a peek into how Rupert Murdoch shapes coverage at his news organizations.
Each Murdoch speaks roughly daily to Fox News chief executive Suzanne Scott, she testified. Lachlan Murdoch said he had a daily chat with Scott, but that it was only once or twice a week.
“I’m a journalist at heart,” the elder Murdoch, who is just two weeks shy of his 92nd birthday, said in his deposition. I like to be involved with these things.
Rupert Murdoch, Fox News, Meade Cooper and the Time for a Better Fox News Executive: Corrections to the Recommendation
Scott forwarded his recommendation to the top executive over prime-time programming, Meade Cooper. She and another executive canceled the show over fears that the guests will say the election is being stolen, if she does not push back, according to the filings.
Scott was “calling now” to remedy the damage done by Lachlan Murdoch after he warned her that a Fox News anchor’s coverage of a Trump rally was “mug and obnoxious”. (Anchor Leland Vittert’s final appearance on Fox was in January 2021; he is now an anchor for the fledgling cable news outlet NewsNation.)
Anne Dias, a director at Fox Corp wrote to the Murdochs. “I believe that the time has come for Fox News or for you, Lachlan, to make a stand.” It is an important moment for the nation and Fox News as a brand.
Rupert advised Lachlan, “Just tell her … Fox News, which called the election correctly, is pivoting as fast as possible. It isn’t as simple as it might seem for us to lead our viewers.
On January 26, Tucker Carlson had a guest on his show. Rupert Murdoch told Dominion’s attorneys he could stop taking money for MyPillow ads, “[B]ut I’m not about to.”
Ben Smith, the editor in-chief of Semafor, said Murdochs are likely setting Suzanne Scott up to take the fall for this.
Murdoch’s Troubles with the Media: How he Threw Over the Side of the Scandal and Emotional Scenarios
Some of our most important relationships with media are not rational, I believe. They are often tied to psychological and emotional needs as described in the book “Imaginary Social Worlds: A Cultural Approach” by John L. Caughey.
Murdoch has faced serious and embarrassing matters in his media empire before. In 2011, his now-defunct News of the World newspaper was ensnared in a phone hacking scandal. In 2016, Fox News founder Roger Ailes was accused in an explosive lawsuit of sexual harassment. And in 2017, star host Bill O’Reilly was caught in his own sexual misconduct scandal.
Murdoch decided to give up ties with top personnel in each case. A source who used to work at Murdoch-world said Wednesday that his pattern was to throw some money and offer a head or two to make it go away. And cutting ties with Scott would appear to be one of the easier ousters for Murdoch to execute over the course of his decades at the helm of one of the world’s biggest media empires.
Folkenflik noted that Murdoch and the companies have tended to pay early and quietly to make things go away or ignore them, thinking they are so big they can ride things out. “And then when things really come to a head, they try to cauterize the wound at the lowest level possible.”
Folkenflik said that if he threw Scott over, he’d do it because he thought he needed to cackle the wound before it went higher. “That’s his record. That’s what he does. It could also be an editor. It can be someone in charge. It is possible to be stars. He’s not throwing himself over the side.”
Folkenflik explained that everyone who takes a senior executive position under Murdoch knows it is the ultimate fall position. They are aware that is part of the job. You’re a well-paid person. It can be a good life if you work hard. If you fall out of favor with the sun king, or it is to his benefit, that’s part of the equation.”
We’ll see what Scott’s fate ultimately looks like. Fox isn’t saying anything publicly about her for now. When I reached out to Fox spokespeople on Wednesday asking for comment, the company declined.
The Fox News Channel: Why Did Murdoch Become Confidential about Biden’s Ads? What Happened to Murdoch in 2020?
It was thought to be an outlet that could be utilized to amplify a conservative viewpoint by a person who helped put Richard Nixon in the White House. From day one, it was about propaganda – not information. The reason for creating it was to counterbalance what Ailes saw as liberal bias in network TV, public radio and top newspapers in the country. The channel was always about politics and ideology, but he referred to it as news.
Now, it’s all about right-wing politics (the hotter and nastier, the better) and money. And not necessarily in that order, as Murdoch suggested in his description of why he allowed Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow, to espouse unfounded election conspiracies on Fox:
Today, Fox is further away from the news part of its name than ever. It still presents itself as a news channel in name using the tropes of anchor desks, correspondents and panels of guests.
But it’s become so much deeper culturally. Fox News is a lifestyle, which is meant to be seen in a way that is comforting to elderly adults, who are most likely left behind or threatened by the changes in American life. Fox tells them that if they are struggling, it is not their fault. The Democrats in Washington are giving away the country to immigrants and minorities, which is illogical and false, as the money is coming out of viewers’ pockets.
If you look rationally at the potential effect of Murdoch’s admission, you might think some audience members would be so angry they might tune out the channel forever.
My family will not be changing their viewing habits because of Murdoch’s deposition. And I suspect most other viewers who have let Fox News that far into their lives won’t be either.
► Murdoch gave Jared Kushner “confidential information” about then-candidate Joe Biden’s ads “along with debate strategy” in 2020, a filing said, offering Donald Trump’s son-in-law “a preview of Biden’s ads before they were public.”
► Following Trump’s loss, Murdoch told Scott to “concentrate on Georgia” when the state was holding a high-stakes special election that would decide the balance of power in the US Senate, instructing her to be “helping any way we can.”
Murdoch told Scott and Wallace that anything during the day is helpful. but Sean [Hannity] and Laura [Ingraham] dumping on him hard might save the day.”
Murdoch made sure Fox banged on about the issues when the New York Post editor told him that Biden was only aiming to stay in his basement and not face serious questions. If the audience talks the theme will spread.”
Among those who say they aren’t shocked: former journalists at Fox News, who suggest that maybe the public now better understands what they saw from the inside.
“There isn’t one thing that surprised or struck me” says the former commentator and guest host. “And I’ve read everything in those filings.”
Cameron left Fox about seven months into the Trump administration — after 21 years at the network. He later said “right wing hosts drowned out straight journalism” at the channel.
“There was a time when the journalists had some control,” Cameron says now. “That has changed,” he said. And exactly when that started … really doesn’t matter. The organization had a serious legal problem, which it ended up with. “
They all point to the departure of Roger Ailes, the disgraced former Fox News chief.
The Most Powerful Name in News ‘Between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’: An Analysis of Stirewalt and Collins
“The people who stayed — by the very nature of being allowed to stay — had to accept the notion that they were going to be led by the mob and the mob was being led by Donald Trump,” Roginsky says.
“It was particularly sad for an organization that had used to call itself ‘the most powerful name in news’ that it was such a fear-driven, such an anxious thing.” Stirell says. “If I can be especially corny I would say that the good of the republic is the refusal to suffer the short-term cost for the long-term good,” he said.
Stire, Sammon, and other journalists were forced out by Fox before Biden took office. (A top Fox News PR executive said “Chris Stirewalt’s quest for relevancy knows no bounds.” He is the political director of News Nation.
Fox News had a good Election Day. Jeff Collins, an executive who oversees advertising for the network, wrote the memo describing the records the channel had just set.
How did CNN lose a vote in the first two weeks of the election? A tweet from a man who didn’t cover election fraud
-audiences don’t want to see too much of the Mayor Pete’s and Coons etc in the news hours. Need to be careful about bookings next 2 months – especially in news hours
A week after the election, a consensus quickly hardened inside the network: It could not continue to lose viewers to a much smaller right-wing cable news rival, Newsmax.
Alex Pfeiffer is a person You told me to tell you if we are getting attacked on Twitter so I will. Many viewers were upset tonight that we didn’t cover election fraud.
Is this what you saw? [Texts a tweet with an excerpt of a Washington Post article that quotes an anonymous Republican official who says Mr. Trump will eventually get tired of claiming he was cheated and leave office.]
