Fox News Settles Election Defamation Lawsuit

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Facts

  • Fox News has announced that a settlement has been reached with Venezuelan businessman Majed Khalil, ending a defamation case in which Khalil claimed he was falsely accused by host Lou Dobbs of helping rig the 2020 US presidential election against Donald Trump.1
  • Khalil had called the accusation, which aired in December 2020, a "lie totally devoid of reality." Fox allegedly portrayed Khalil as one of four people who worked with two electronic voting companies — Dominion and Smartmatic — to ensure that Joe Biden won the election.2
  • Financial terms of the settlement were not specified within the letter filed to US District Court Judge Louis Lee Stanton in New York's Southern District. A Fox News spokesperson told The Hill that the matter had been "resolved amicably by both sides."3
  • The lawsuit was directed at Lou Dobbs, who called Khalil the "COO of the election project" on air and on Twitter, as well as attorney Sidney Powell. In September, Judge Stanton ruled it was untrue and that the claims harmed Khalil's reputation.4
  • Dobbs had urged his followers to "get familiar" with Khalil and three others in relation to what he called a "cyber Pearl Harbor" concerning the 2020 election result. He was taken off the air in February 2021 — multiple investigations have found no evidence of wrongdoing during the election.5
  • This comes as jury selection is set to begin Thursday for a lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems Corp. against Fox News for $1.6B. It's also claiming defamation as part of the continued controversy surrounding the 2020 election coverage.6

Sources: 1Guardian, 2Law & Crime, 3The Hill, 4Bloomberg, 5Independent, and 6Reuters.

Narratives

  • Left narrative, as provided by The Brown and White. The series of defamation suits against Fox raises the issue of how far the media can bend the truth before they are held accountable. Fox knew that many of its claims were untrue, yet it continued to push its on-air narratives to prevent viewers from leaving the network for the likes of Newsmax or One America. No matter the verdict of the cases, the limits of lying in the news have now been firmly established.
  • Right narrative, as provided by Federalist. While right-wing outlets get all the attention, one need look no further than MSNBC to see how left-wing establishment media are protected from defamation cases like these, as the left-wing network is still airing segments accusing Trump of being a Russian operative. Years after the Russia hoax was debunked, these news outlets still allow accusations like these to reach millions of viewers with no fear of retribution. There are clear double standards at play.