Democrats demand Fox halt misinformation
WASHINGTON — Democratic leaders are sending a letter to Fox News executives demanding the network stop spreading misinformation about the 2020 election and for its hosts to admit on air they were wrong to do so. The letter comes amid reports that Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch admitted in a deposition that some Fox hosts “were endorsing” election falsehoods and that he wished the network had pushed back harder on such conspiracy theories.
In a letter to the network’s executives Wednesday, Senate majority leader Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New
York, and House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York, cited testimony from Murdoch that was made public this week as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against the network.
“As noted in your deposition released yesterday, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and other Fox News personalities knowingly, repeatedly, and dangerously endorsed and promoted the ‘big lie’ that Donald Trump won the 2020 presidential election,” Schumer and Jeffries wrote. “Though you have acknowledged your regret in allowing this grave propaganda to take place, your network hosts continue to promote, spew, and perpetuate election conspiracy theories to this day.”
Schumer and Jeffries noted that Fox News leadership was aware of the dangers of broadcasting such claims — including Murdoch, who according to the deposition said former president Donald Trump’s election lies were “damaging” and “really crazy stuff.”
“Despite that shocking admission, Fox News hosts have continued to peddle election denialism to the American people,” the Democratic leaders wrote. “This sets a dangerous precedent that ignores basic journalistic fact-checking principles and public accountability.”
The two also slammed House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s decision to give Fox News host Tucker Carlson exclusive access to more than 40,000 hours of surveillance footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol by a pro-Trump mob seeking to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s Electoral College win. Carlson, who has downplayed the severity of the insurrection and claimed it was a “false flag” operation, suggested without evidence on his program Monday night that some of the footage “already in some ways . . . does contradict” what has been reported about the Jan. 6 insurrection.
The Washington Post was among about a dozen media outlets who demanded the same access to the surveillance footage, arguing through an attorney last month that “there is concern that an ideologicallybased narrative of an already polarizing event will take hold in the public consciousness.” McCarthy has defended his decision to give Carlson exclusive access to the footage, calling the press “jealous.”