Worry that – real, judging by Fox’s ratings after the election – played a key role in Fox not setting the record straight about claims of unfounded fraud, the accuser of the network contends.
“It’s amazing how weak ratings make good reporters do bad things,” said Fox Washington news executive Bill Sammon.
The details were included in private communications discovered by attorneys and contained in a brief filed Thursday by Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion claims in a lawsuit for $ 1.6 billion that Fox aired allegations that Dominion had doctored the vote against Trump, even who knew that was not true. Fox said it was doing its job as a journalist by airing the allegations against Trump and his allies.
Fox’s internal problems began with the right call: announcing on election night 2020 that Democrat Joe Biden had defeated Trump in Arizona. The announcement, before other news organizations, angered the president and his fans.
The backlash was noted in an internal email. “Holy cow, our audience is mad at the network,” said one, quoted by Dominion. “He’s FURIOUS,” said another.
Five days after the election, Fox News founder Rupert Murdoch told Suzanne Scott, CEO of Fox News, that the channel was “being creamed by CNN. They thought our audience didn’t want to watch it,” according to court papers.
Fox News fell from first to third in the news network ratings between the November 3, 2020 election and Biden’s inauguration on January 20, 2021, according to the Nielsen company. Meanwhile, thousands of Fox viewers flocked to the more conservative Newsmax, where prime-time viewers shot from 58,000 the week before the election to 568,000 the week after.
The change shook the foundations of a network that had consistently led news ratings for two decades.
Fox roared back into the lead with a surge to the right after Biden took office. But shortly after the election, there was genuine concern at the New York headquarters.
Almost immediately, the network was “on the warpath,” Dominion said, citing Fox executives.
“Do the executives realize how much credibility and trust they have lost with their audience?” Fox prime-time star Tucker Carlson wrote to the producer, according to Dominion’s summary. “We are playing with fire, in fact … alternatives like newsmax could destroy us.”
Dominion asserted that Fox executives made the decision to push a false narrative to attract viewers, and pointed to claims made by Trump allies like attorney Sidney Powell about the program hosted by Maria Bartiromo and Lou Dobbs.
On November 9, Fox News Channel’s Neil Cavuto interrupted a press conference held by Trump aide Kayleigh McEnaney when she began spreading unsubstantiated allegations. A Fox executive complained after Cavuto damaged the network’s brand.
The court filing also describes two cases in which Fox News reporters were attacked internally for fact-checking tweeting. In one, reporter Jacqui Heinrich tweeted that there is no evidence of the voting system deleted, lost or changed votes.
“Please get him fired,” Carlson messaged fellow anchor Sean Hannity, saying Heinrich was hurting the company, according to Dominion’s filing. Heinrich’s tweet was later deleted, court papers said.
Carlson himself tried to “thread the needle,” Dominion said. He notes how he has publicly stated that Powell has never provided any evidence to support his fraud claims. “On the other hand, he didn’t say he believed it personally – he lied,” Dominion said.
Fox said many specific responses will come to the document that Superior Court Judge Eric Davis in Delaware ordered closed until February 27. Fox said Dominion has mischaracterized the record and cherry-picked quotes stripped of key context.
“There has been a lot of noise and confusion caused by Dominion and opportunistic private equity owners, but the heart of this case remains about freedom of the press and freedom of speech, which are fundamental rights granted by the Constitution and protected by the New York Times v. Sullivan,” said Fox.
If either party can persuade Davis to grant summary judgment in their favor, the case will end without a jury trial. If not, the trial is scheduled to begin in mid-April.
As a result of Sullivan and subsequent cases, such defamation cases against journalists are usually very hard to prove, and Fox also argued that Dominion grossly overestimating the economic damage to the company.
Ultimately, though, the case draws back what happened to the nation’s largest media outlet that attracted a conservative audience at a pivotal time in the network’s, and the nation’s, history.
“Personally, Fox hosts and executives know that Donald Trump lost the election and they have to admit it,” Dominion said in a paper released Thursday. “But Fox viewers are hearing a different story — over and over again.”
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