It is a lawsuit that could mark a decisive moment in the history of defamation and in the “alternative” realities invented for years by Donald Trump.
A Delaware court is preparing to host a jury trial on Tuesday between the radical right-wing American television network Fox News and the company Dominion Voting Systems, which instantly became the target of the ex-president and his supporters in the aftermath of the Populist’s 2020 election defeat. The news network had promoted and amplified conspiracy theories claiming the Dominion had rigged the poll results by sneaking votes cast in favor of Donald Trump in Joe Biden’s camp. Accusations made in contradiction to the facts, threatening to democracy and which now find themselves at the heart of one of the most watched libel trials in the United States.
Was the “Big Lie” Spread on Purpose?
This is the question posed by Dominion in this lawsuit while claiming no less than 1.6 billion dollars in damages, for damage to its reputation and loss of contracts which followed the smear campaign of which it claims to have been the victim. . And several elements added to the file in recent weeks tend to bring water to his mill.
Last February, court filings revealed that several Fox News hosts privately acknowledged the absurdity of the accusations of voter fraud made by Trump and his supporters, yet continued to promote them. on the air, at prime time. Icons of far-right political commentary, network stars Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham, are among those spokespersons.
In their internal communications, with each other or with the bosses of Fox News, several hosts did not hesitate to describe the campaign of denigration of the electoral process by the populist as “breathtaking”, “completely blown” and “total bullshit “.
“He’s behaving like a madman,” Sean Hannity reportedly wrote of Donald Trump in the weeks following his election defeat, while himself fueling his “big lie” about stealing the election.
“Sidney Powell is lying,” Trump-promoting producer Tucker Carlson wrote on Fox News about the Trump lawyer who regularly carried the ex-president’s message against the Dominion on the network’s airwaves. . According to him, Trump was then perceived in private as a “demonic force” with a talent for “destroying things”, while on the air, this same Tucker Carlson repeated ad nauseam that the Republicans had been robbed of the presidential ballot.
Even Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch fueled this doublespeak by dismissing the ex-president’s claims of voter fraud in a memo to an executive in his network. It is “very difficult to credibly claim that there were widespread errors [du système électoral] he wrote, while referring to Trump’s obsession as “a terrible thing that hurts everyone.”
Can the trial erode the influence of the radical right network?
In the pages of the British daily The GuardianHarvard law professor Laurence Tribe said a few days ago that he had “never seen a libel case with such overwhelming evidence” against a defendant who admitted in writing “that he fabricated false information in order to increase its ratings and revenues”.
In his sworn deposition, Rupert Murdoch admitted that the hosts of his network “supported” the lie of the ex-president about an election theft that never happened and said, that “with hindsight”, he would have “liked that [son réseau] was stronger to denounce it”. The 92-year-old billionaire also admitted he could have ordered Fox News not to publicize Trump lawyers, including Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani, as their conspiracy theories, in the wake of the ballot. ” I could have. But I didn’t,” he said.
Still, the network’s lawyers believe that the network’s coverage of these theories remains protected by freedom of expression and that Dominion Voting Systems has made a “biased selection” in the email and text exchanges of the major figures of Fox News to fuel its argument with a knowingly broadcast lie. According to Murdoch’s empire, the reporters did nothing more than report “information of public interest”.
On Monday, the ex-president invited himself into this trial by calling on Mr. Murdoch to adhere to his allegations of electoral fraud if the media mogul were to testify in court. “Fox News is going to be in big trouble if it doesn’t reveal the truth about cheating in the 2020 election,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “When Rupert Murdoch says there was no fraud, in light of massive evidence, it’s ridiculous and very damaging [au réseau dans l’affaire en cours]. »
Dominion, for its part, claims that this campaign launched against it resulted in the termination and non-renewal of 20 contracts in addition to having compromised business prospects in 39 other electoral jurisdictions. A deleterious climate, which would have reduced the value of the company by 921 million dollars.
Can the Fox News network still avoid a lawsuit?
Originally scheduled for Monday, the start of the hearing in the Delaware court was postponed for 24 hours, late Sunday evening, to allow the parties to sit down again to try to reach a amicable settlement, reported the washington post. Fox News’ lawsuit seeks to avoid a high-profile trial, whose unpacking of evidence and parade of big stars at the helm over the next five weeks could damage the network’s reputation. In addition to Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham, Rupert Murdoch should be among those called to testify by the opposing party.
Last December, Fox News and Dominion have already tried to conclude such an agreement, but without success. THE washington post reported at the time that the amount of damages claimed by the operator of the voting machines, as well as the demand for a public apology by Fox News, had led the discussions to an impasse.
Last week, however, Murdoch’s empire settled another defamation lawsuit brought by Venezuelan businessman Majed Khalil against ex-Fox Business network star host Lou Dobbs, who had accused of playing a prominent role in Trump’s falsely alleged election theft. The content of the agreement remains secret.